THREE  STUDIES  IN 
LITERATURE 


■?&&&• 


THREE  STUDIES  IN 
LITERATURE 


BY 


LEWIS   E.    GATES 

ASSISTANT   PROFESSOR  OF  ENGLISH  IN   HARVARD 
UNIVERSITY 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

LONDON  :  MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Ltd. 
1899 

All  rights  reserved 


t 


Copyright,  1899, 

Bt  the  macmillan  company 


^79<r2- 


NorfaooD  JPrtSB 

J.  S.  Cushins  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith 
Norwood  Mass.  U.S.A. 


NOTE 

These  Studies  were  originally  introductory  es- 
says in  volumes  of  selections  from  the  prose  writ- 
ings of  Jeffrey,  Newman,  and  Arnold.  The  essay 
on  Jeffrey  has  been  rewritten  and  expanded.  My 
thanks  are  due  to  Messrs.  Ginn  and  Co.  for  the 
use  of  the  essay  on  Jeffrey,  and  to  Messrs.  Henry 
Holt  and  Co.  for  leave  to  reprint  the  essays  on 
Newman  and  Arnold. 

December  15,  1898. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


1 

I. 

Jeffrey's  Reputation 

1 

II. 

General  Characteristics  . 

6 

III. 

Literary  Criticism  .... 

12 

IV. 

The  Edinburgh  Review    . 

41 

V. 

The  New  Editorial  Policy 

46 

VI. 

The  New  Literary  Form 

54 

VII. 

Conclusion 

59 

Newman 

as  a  Prose-Writer 

64 

I. 

Newman's  Manner  and  its  Critics . 

64 

II. 

The  Rhetorician      .... 

72 

in. 

82 

IV. 

88 

v. 

92 

VI. 

Additional  Characteristics 

98 

VII. 

'Relation  to  his  Times     . 

108 

Vll 


yiii                                  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Matthew  Arnold 124 

I.     Arnold's  Manner 

124 

II.     Criticism  of  Life 

129 

III.     Theory  of  Culture 

139 

IV.     Ethical  Bias    . 

151 

V.     Literary  Criticism 

163 

VI.     Appreciations 

171 

VII.     Style       . 

180 

VIII.     Relation  to  his  Times 

200 

FRANCIS    JEFFREY 


Who  now  reads  Jeffrey?  Only  those,  it  may 
be  feared,  who  are  intent  on  some  scholarly  pur- 
pose or  victims  of  sharp  necessity.  Yet  in  1809 
Jeffrey  could  boast  that  his  articles  in  the  Edin- 
burgh Review  were  read  by  fifty  thousand  thinking 
people  within  a  month  after  publication.  Jef- 
frey's reputation  as  a  critic  has  run  through  a  pict- 
uresquely varied  course.  During  nearly  the  first 
half  of  the  century  he  was,  for  many  eminently 
intelligent  Englishmen,  an  all  but  infallible  au- 
thority in  letters  and  whatever  pertained  to  them. 
He  was  Horner's  and  Sydney  Smith's  "  King  Jam- 
fray  " ;  he  was  for  Macaulay  "  more  nearly  a  uni- 
versal genius  than  any  man  of  our  time."  Even 
Carlyle  declared  no  critic  since  Jeffrey's  day 
"worth  naming  beside  him."  And  when  that 
half-national  institution,  the  Encyclopaedia  Britan- 
nica,  required  in  its  columns  a  discussion  of  the 
theory  of  art,  Jeffrey  it  was  who  was  called  in  as 
an  authority  and  wrote  the  article  on  "  Beauty  " 
that,  down  to  1875,  stood  as  representing  authentic 
English  opinion  in  matters  of  taste. 
b  1 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY 


Even  those  who  hated  Jeffrey  admitted  his 
power.  "Birds  seldom  sing,"  quoth  Allan  Cun- 
ningham, "  when  the  kite  is  in  the  air,  and  bards 
dreaded  the  Judge  Jeffrey  of  our  day  as  much  as 
political  offenders  dreaded  the  Judge  Jeffreys  of 
James  the  Second."  Talfourd,  Lamb's  friend 
and  editor,  asserted  of  Jeffrey  that  "with  little 
imagination,  little  genuine  wit,  and  no  clear  view 
of  any  great  and  central  principles  of  criticism,  he 
.  .  .  continued  to  dazzle,  to  astonish,  and  occa- 
sionally to  delight  multitudes  of  readers,  and  at 
one  time  to  hold  the  temporary  fate  of  authors  in 
his  hands." 

By  way  of  final  testimony  to  the  magnitude  of 
Jeffrey's  fame,  Macaulay  and  Carlyle  may  be 
quoted  at  length  in  his  praise.  One  of  Macaulay's 
letters  of  1828  deals  wholly  with  his  impressions 
of  Jeffrey,  at  whose  home  he  had  just  been  stay- 
ing; the  tone  of  the  letter  is  that  of  unmixed 
hero-worship;  no  details  of  the  Scotch  critic's 
appearance  or  habits  or  opinions  are  too  slight 
to  be  sent  to  the  Macaulay  household  in  London. 
"  He  has  twenty  faces  almost  as  unlike  each  other 
as  my  father's  to  Mr.  Wilberforce's.  .  .  .  The 
mere  outline  of  his  face  is  insignificant.  The  ex- 
pression is  everything;  and  such  power  and  variety 
of  expression  I  never  saw  in  any  human  counte- 
nance. .  .  .  The  flow  of  his  kindness  is  quite 
inexhaustible.  .  .  .  His  conversation  is  very 
much  like  his  countenance  and  his  voice,  of  im- 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  3 

mense  variety.  .  .  .  He  is  a  shrewd  observer; 
and  so  fastidious  that  I  am  not  surprised  at  the 
awe  in  which  many  people  seem  to  stand  when  in 
his  company."  l  These  are  only  a  few  of  Macau- 
lay's  details  and  admiring  comments.  Nor  did 
he  outgrow  this  intense  admiration.  In  April, 
1843,  he  writes  to  Macvey  Napier  that  he  has 
read  and  reread  Jeffrey's  old  articles  till  he  knows 
them  by  heart;  and  in  December,  1843,  on  the 
appearance  of  Jeffrey's  collected  essays,  he  ex- 
presses himself  in  almost  unmeasured  terms: 
"The  variety  and  versatility  of  Jeffrey's  mind 
seem  to  me  more  extraordinary  than  ever.  .  .  . 
I  do  not  think  that  any  one  man  except  Jeffrey, 
nay  that  any  three  men,  could  have  produced  such 
diversified  excellence.  .  .  .  Take  him  all  in  all, 
I  think  him  more  nearly  an  universal  genius  than 
any  man  of  our  time." 2 

Macaulay,  however,  may  not  be  wholly  beyond 
suspicion  as  a  witness  in  Jeffrey's  favour.  He 
himself  had  much  of  Jeffrey's  dryness  and  posi- 
tiveness  of  nature,  was  temperamentally  limited 
in  many  of  the  same  ways,  and  was,  like  Jeffrey, 
an  ardent  Whig  of  the  Constitutional  type;  for  all 
these  reasons  he  may  be  thought  prejudiced.  In 
Carlyle,  on  the  other  hand,  we  have  a  witness  who 
was  as  far  as  possible  from  sympathy  with  Jef- 
frey's  neat   little   formulas    in    art   and  in   poli- 

1  Life  and  Letters  of  Lord  Macaulay,  chap.  3. 

2  Ibid.,  chap.  9. 


4  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

tics,  and  who  has  never  been  accused  of  register- 
ing unduly  charitable  opinions  of  even  his  best 
friends.  Yet  of  Jeffrey  he  says,  "It  is  certain 
there  has  no  Critic  appeared  among  us  since  who 
was  worth  naming  beside  him; — and  his  influ- 
ence, for  good  and  for  evil,  in  Literature  and 
otherwise,  has  been  very  great.  .  .  .  His  Ed- 
inburgh Review  [was]  a  kind  of  Delphic  Oracle, 
and  Voice  of  the  Inspired,  for  great  majorities  of 
what  is  called  the  'Intelligent  Public';  and  him- 
self regarded  universally  as  a  man  of  consummate 
penetration,  and  the  facile  princeps  in  the  depart- 
ment he  had  chosen  to  cultivate  and  practise."1 

How  has  it  happened  that  Jeffrey's  lustre,  once 
so  brilliant,  has  paled  in  our  day  into  that  of  a 
fifth-rate  luminary?  Was  his  earlier  reputation 
wholly  undeserved?  Or  is  the  "dumb  forgetful- 
ness  "  that  has  overtaken  him  a  real  case  of  literary 
injustice?  Probably  Jeffrey  is  now  oftenest  re- 
membered for  his  unluckily  haughty  reprimand 
to  Wordsworth,  "  This  will  never  do !  "  —  a  sen- 
tence which  is  popularly  taken  to  be  an  incontes- 
table proof  of  critical  incapacity.  Yet  as  regards 
the  artistic  worth  of  the  Excursion,  the  poem 
against  which  Jeffrey  was  protesting,  judges  are 
at  present  nearer  in  agreement  with  Jeffrey  than 
with  Wordsworth.  Ought  not  Jeffrey,  the  critic, 
then,  to  benefit  somewhat  from  the  latter-day  reac- 
tion against  overweening  Romanticism  ? 

1  Carlyle's  Reminiscences,  II,  271. 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  5 

Doubtless,  Jeffrey's  fate  is  in  part  merely  an 
illustration   of    the   transiency   of   critical   fame. 
Jeffrey,  like  Byrner  and  John  Dennis,  has  gone 
the  deciduous  way  of  all  writers  of  literature  about 
literature,   save  the  few  who  have  been  actually 
themselves,    in   their   prose,    creators   of    beauty. 
Yet  probably  there  is  also  something  exceptional 
in  Jeffrey's  case, — in  his  earlier  complete  ascen- 
dency and  in  the  later  sorry  disinheriting  that  has 
overtaken  him.     Jeffrey's  reputation  was  really  a 
composite  affair,  due  fully  as  much  to  the  timely- 
happy  establishment  of  the  Edinburgh  Review  as 
to  his  own  personal  cleverness,  great  as  that  was. 
On  Jeffrey,  the  editor,  was  reflected  all  the  shin- 
ing success  of  the  first  brilliant  English  Review. 
To  understand,  then,  the  waxing  and  the  waning  of 
Jeffrey's  literary  reputation,  a  somewhat  careful 
analysis  will  be  needed  not  simply  of  his  critical 
genius,  but  also  of  the  methods  for  making  that 
genius  effective  which  fortune  offered  him  and  his 
own  keen  practical  instincts  worked  out  success- 
fully.    As  for  his  individual  worth  as  a  critic,  the 
truth  will  be  found  to  lie,  as  so  often  happens, 
about  midway  between  the  eulogists  and  the  cavil- 
lers.    Judged  even  by  present  standards,  Jeffrey 
was  a  notably  effective  critic;  he  made  blunders 
not  a  few,  but  he  was  acute,  entertaining,  and  sug- 
gestive, even  when  he  went  astray;    he  excelled 
in  rapid  analysis,  apt  illustration,  and  audacious 
satire.     He  developed  critical  method  in  two  very 


6  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

important  directions,  and  seized  upon  and  applied, 
with  at  least  partial  success,  two  critical  princi- 
ples, hardly  recognized  in  England  before  his  day, 
but  thereafter  more  and  more  widely  and  fruitfully 
employed.  All  these  are  points,  however,  that 
need  to  be  minutely  dealt  with  and  illustrated. 


II 


It  was  on  Jeffrey's  versatility  —  the  universality 
of  his  genius  —  that  Macaulay's  comments  in  1843 
laid  special  stress.  That  versatility  remains  note- 
worthy for  good  or  for  ill  to-day.  No  modern  lit- 
erary critic  would  venture  on  the  vast  range  of 
subjects  that  Jeffrey,  even  in  the  seventy  or  eighty 
of  his  essays  that  he  thought  worth  preserving,  has 
magisterially  dealt  with.  His  Collected  Essays 
are  arranged  under  the  following  seven  headings : 
General  Literature;  History;  Poetry;  Philosophy 
of  the  Mind,  Metaphysics,  and  Jurisprudence; 
Prose  Fiction;  General  Politics;  Miscellaneous. 
Under  all  these  headings  the  works  of  distin- 
guished specialists  are  discussed,  and  the  reviewer 
declaims  and  dogmatizes  like  an  expert,  whether 
he  be  holding  forth  on  philosophy  to  Dugald  Stew- 
art or  on  politics  and  law  to  Jeremy  Bentham,  or 
on  poetry  to  Wordsworth  or  Scott.  Such  confident 
universality  is  nowadays  sure  to  suggest  shallow- 
ness, and  yet  the  fact  remains  that  for  twenty-five 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  7 

years  Jeffrey  was  able  to  write  on  this  vast  variety 
of  topics  so  as  to  command  the  thorough  respect 
even  of  his  opponents,  and  so  as  not  simply  to 
avoid  any  scandalous  misadventure  through  false 
information  or  inept  judgments  (unless  in  the  case 
of  Wordsworth),  but  to  rule  almost  arbitrarily  a 
great  mass  of  public  opinion  in  morals,  in  politics, 
and  in  literary  and  artistic  theory.  To  carry 
through  successfully  so  difficult  a  task  is  in  itself 
a  victory  to  be  put  to  the  credit  of  the  audacious 
Scotch  critic,  even  though  his  work  prove  not  in 
all  cases  of  permanent  worth. 

A  rapid  and  pungent  style  and  great  adroitness 
and  attractiveness  in  exposition  were  doubtless 
largely  responsible  for  Jeffrey's  constant  success 
with  his  public.  But,  in  addition  to  these  formal 
excellences,  Jeffrey  was  remarkably  well  equipped 
and  well  trained  for  the  part  of  a  universal  genius. 
Instinct  had  been  beforehand  with  him  and  led  him 
to  prepare  himself  during  a  good  many  years  of 
faithful  study  for  just  the  part  he  was  to  play. 
When  he  had  to  choose  a  profession  he  decided 
for  the  bar,  and  he  was  called  as  a  barrister  in 
1796.  But  both  before  this  decision  and  dur- 
ing his  actual  legal  studies,  he  read  widely  and 
systematically  by  himself  in  general  literature, 
political  theory,  history,  and  philosophy;  and  dur- 
ing all  this  patient,  private  reading,  at  Glasgow 
University,  at  Edinburgh,  and  afterwards  at  Ox- 
ford, he  was  busy,  with  canny  Scotch  diligence,  at 


8  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

note-books,  in  which  facts  and  ideas  and  theoriz- 
ings  were  recorded  and  worked  out.  His  mind 
was  conspicuously  vivacious  and  alert,  —  swift  to 
catch  up  and  make  its  own  new  knowledge,  whether 
about  books  or  life.  This  keenness  of  intellectual 
scent  was  always  characteristic  of  him.  Even 
Matthew  Arnold  has  conceded  to  him  one  trait  of 
the  ideal  critic  —  curiosity.  A  very  different  com- 
mentator, Mrs.  Carlyle,  makes  special  mention, 
after  a  call  from  him,  of  his  "  dark,  penetrating  " 
eyes,  that  "  had  been  taking  note  of  most  things  in 
God's  universe." 

Besides  the  results  of  this  patient  self-discipline, 
and  of  this  wide  ranging  and  swiftly  appropriating 
intellectual  interest,  Jeffrey  had,  in  a  very  high 
degree,  the  barrister's  power  of  seizing,  compre- 
hending, and  controlling,  quickly  and  surely,  a 
vast  mass  of  new  facts.  He  could  "get  up"  an 
unfamiliar  subject  with  unsurpassable  readiness 
and  completeness.  His  mastery  of  his  subject  in 
a  review-article  seems  often  like  the  successful 
barrister's  knowledge  of  his  brief:  he  knows  what- 
\  '  ever  he  needs  to  know  to  carry  the  matter  in  hand 
triumphantly  through. 

His  way  of  unfolding  a  subject  is  always  deft 
and  delightful  to  follow.  He  had  a  sure  exposi- 
tory instinct.  Point  by  point,  the  most  complex 
problem  takes  on,  under  his  treatment,  at  least  a 
specious  simplicity,  and  the  most  abstract  theorem, 
alluring  familiarity,  and  definiteness.     He  is  gen- 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  9 

erous  with  illustrations  and  examples  and  mis- 
chievous in  giving  them  a  satirical  turn.  Despite 
his  Scotch  bias  towards  theorizing,  he  knows  and 
"  hugs  "  his  facts,  and  his  discussions  always  keep 
close  to  experience. 

His  breadth  of  view  is  remarkable,  if  his  work 
be  compared  with  that  of  eighteenth-century  critics. 
Whatever  the  book  or  question  under  discussion, 
Jeffrey  lifts  it  into  the  region  of  general  principles, 
and  is  not  content  with  formal  judgments  of  literary 
worth  or  with  random  comments  on  special  points. 
He  is  really  bent  on  setting  up  "a  free  play  of 
ideas "  over  the  literature  and  the  modes  of  life 
that  he  criticises,  and  on  orienting  his  readers  as 
regards  not  simply  the  special  work  under  discus- 
sion, but  the  whole  field  of  art  or  of  study  to  which 
it  belongs.  That  his  theories,  at  least  in  literary 
matters,  were  not  always  searching  or  profound, 
that  they  will  not,  in  sweep  and  thoroughness,  bear 
comparison  with  those,  for  example,  of  Coleridge, 
the  great  system-weaver  of  the  Eomanticists,  is 
undoubtedly  true.  Yet  even  in  literary  theory  Jef- 
frey, as  will  be  presently  shown,  hit  on  some 
notable  truths;  he  partially  comprehended  and 
applied  the  historical  method  for  the  study  of  lit- 
erature ;  he  worked  out  with  Alison  an  interpreta- 
tion of  beauty,  which,  though  false  in  its  emphasis 
and  distorted,  recognized  and  illustrated  with  great 
acuteness  one  highly  important  and  comparatively 
neglected  source  of  aesthetic  emotion;  and,  despite 


10  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

much  mistaken  ridicule  of  Romantic  poetry  and 
much  insensibility  to  its  quintessential  power  and 
charm,  he  showed  his  critical  insight  in  his  protests 
against  certain  radical  defects  alike  in  the  ethical 
and  in  the  aesthetic  theory  of  the  Romanticists,  — 
defects  which,  as  Jeffrey  contended  and  as  modern 
criticism  admits,  do  much  to  invalidate  Romantic 
poetry,  both  as  a  criticism  of  life  and  as  a  perma- 
nently invigorating  imaginative  stimulus.  But 
even  apart  from  the  absolute  correctness  or  finality 
of  Jeffrey's  theorizing,  his  practice  of  raising  criti- 
cism into  the  region  of  general  principles  and  of 
examining  the  material  worth  of  books  even  more 
searchingly  than  their  barely  formal  qualities,  was  a 
renovating  change  in  criticism,  and  at  once  gave 
new  consideration  and  dignity  to  the  work  of  the 
critic.  Mind  was  at  any  rate  fermenting  in  what- 
ever Jeffrey  wrote,  and  for  the  most  part  the  writ- 
ing of  earlier  reviewers  had  been  a  barren  waste 
of  words. 

Finally,  Jeffrey's  style  startled  and  challenged 
and  terrified  and  amused,  and  through  its  briskness 
and  audacity,  its  swift  sparkle  and  gay  bravado, 
its  satire  and  banter,  its  impetuous  fulness  and 
unfailing  wealth  of  fact  and  illustration  fairly  cap- 
tivated a  public  that  was  used  to  the  humdrum, 
conventional  speech  of  penny-a-lining  critics. 
There  is  a  fine  vein  of  mischief  in  Jeffrey  that 
leads  continually  to  very  grateful  ridicule  of 
pedantry,    dulness,   and   all   kinds    of    absurdity. 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  11 

Even  the  devoutest  Wordsworthian  will,  if  lie  be 
not  an  ingrained  prig,  relish  Jeffrey's  raillery  at 
the  expense  of  Wordsworth's  occasional  pompous 
ineptitude.  And  if  Jeffrey's  vivacity  still  seems 
amusing,  how  much  more  irresistible  must  his 
style  have  seemed  before  the  days  of  Hazlitt  and 
Lamb  and  Macaulay  and  Carlyle.  His  dash  and 
wit  and  audacity  were  new  in  literary  criticism, 
and  for  the  time  being  seemed  to  the  public  almost 
more  than  mortal. 

Whether  or  no  all  these  qualities  of  Jeffrey's 
genius  and  style  are  those  of  the  ideal  literary 
critic,  they  were  fitted  to  gain  him  success  and  re- 
nown as  a  brilliant,  argumentative  writer  on  literary 
topics.  And,  in  point  of  fact,  this  is  what  Jeffrey 
really  was;  he  was  a  typically  well  equipped  and 
skilful  middleman  of  ideas.  He  found  an  increas- 
ingly large  Liberal  or  Whig  public  anxious  to  have 
its  beliefs  expressed  plausibly,  its  feelings  justi- 
fied, and  its  taste  made  clear  to  itself  and  gently 
improved.  The  Whig  "sheep  looked  up,"  and 
Jeffrey  fed  them.  He  did  much  the  same  work  in 
general  literary,  social,  and  political  theory  that 
Macaulay  did  later  in  history.  Macaulay's  histori- 
cal essays,  also  published  in  the  Edinburgh  Review, 
were,  as  Cotter  Morison  has  pointed  out,  "great 
historical  cartoons,"  specially  adapted  for  the 
popularization  of  history,  and  specially  suited  to 
the  knowledge  and  aspirations  of  an  intelligent 
middle-class  public.     Jeffrey's  essays  in  literature 


12  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

had  much  this  same  character  and  value.  They 
interpreted  the  freshest,  most  vital  thought  of  the 
time,  so  far  as  possible  in  harmony  with  Whig 
formulas,  and  judged  it  by  Whig  standards ;  they 
made  happily  articulate  Whig  prejudices  on  all 
subjects,  from  the  French  Revolution  to  Words- 
worth's peasant  poetry.  By  their  masterly  exposi- 
tion, their  incisive  argument,  and  their  wit,  they 
entertained  even  those  whom  they  exasperated. 
Their  success  was  prompt  and  unexampled. 

Ill 

It  has  already  been  hinted  that  the  qualities  of 
Jeffrey's  genius  and  style,  great  as  may  have  been 
their  value  for  the  work  he  accomplished,  are  not, 
when  judged  from  the  modern  point  of  view,  alto- 
gether those  of  the  ideal  literary  critic.  This  is 
particularly  true  if  appreciation  be  included  as 
a  vital  part  of  the  critic's  task.  Jeffrey  rarely 
appreciates  a  piece  of  literature,  interprets  it 
imaginatively,  lends  himself  to  its  peculiar  charm, 
and  expresses  this  charm  through  sympathetic 
symbolism.  His  readiness  and  his  plausibility 
are  not  the  only  points  in  which  Jeffrey  the  critic 
suggests  Jeffrey  the  advocate.  He  has  the  defects 
as  well  as  the  merits  of  the  law}rer  in  literature. 
He  is  always  for  or  against  his  author;  he  is 
always  making  points.  The  intellectual  interest 
preponderates  in  his  critical  work,  and  his  discus- 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  13 

sions  often  seem,  particularly  to  a  reader  of  mod- 
ern impressionistic  criticism,  hard,  unsympathetic, 
searchingly  analytical,  repellingly  abstract  and 
systematic.  He  is  always  on  the  watch ;  he  never 
lends  himself  confidingly  to  his  author  and  takes 
passively  and  gratefully  the  mood  and  the  images 
his  author  suggests.  He  never  loiters  or  dreams. 
He  is  full  of  business  and  bustle,  and  perpetually 
distracts  his  readers  with  his  sense  of  the  need  of 
making  definite  progress.  He  is  one  of  those  re- 
sponsible folk  who  believe  that 

"  Nothing  of  itself  will  come 
But  we  must  still  be  seeking." 

For  delicate  and  subtle  appreciation,  then,  of  the 
best  modern  type  it  is  useless  to  look  in  Jeffrey's 
essays. 

Of  course,  historically,  such  criticism  could 
hardly  have  been  expected  in  1803.  The  critical 
tradition  that  Jeffrey  fell  heir  to  was  that  of  the 
dogmatists,  —  the  tradition  that  came  down  from 
Ascham,  the  pedagogue,  through  the  hands  of  the 
would-be  autocrats,  Kyiner  and  Dennis,  to  Dr. 
Johnson.  The  theories  of  the  dogmatists  suffered 
many  changes,  but  remained  nevertheless  true  to 
one  fundamental  principle:  the  critic  was  to  be 
accepted  as  an  infallible  judge  in  literature  because 
of  his  familiarity  with  certain  models  or  certain 
abstract  rules,  the  imitation  or  the  observance  of 
which  was  essential  to  good  art.     The  dogmatic 


14  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

critic  deemed  himself  lord  of  literature  by  a  kind 
of  divine  right.  Ascham  believed  in  the  plenary 
artistic  inspiration  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  classics, 
and  posed  as  the  authentic  interpreter  of  the  sacred 
literary  word.  The  pseudo-classical  critics,  Eymer 
and  Dennis,  based  themselves  also  partly  on  au- 
thority, but  even  more  upon  reason ;  they  pretended 
to  rule  by  the  divine  right  of  pure  logic.  Their 
implicit  postulate  might  be  likened  to  Hobbes's 
theory  in  politics ;  they  substantially  held  that  the 
strongest  must  keep  order  in  the  commonwealth, 
and  that  in  the  literary  commonwealth  this  duty 
fell  to  the  intellectually  strongest.  Accordingly, 
these  critics  administered  justice  magisterially  in 
accordance  with  a  strict  code  of  laws;  they  had 
laws  for  the  epic  poet,  laws  for  the  writer  of  com- 
edy, laws  for  the  satirist,  laws  for  the  writer  of 
tragedy;  the  author  of  every  new  piece  of  litera- 
ture was  called  up  to  the  bar  and  reprimanded  for 
the  least  illegality.  In  short,  the  dogmatic  critic 
regarded  himself  and  was  generally  regarded  as 
able  to  apply  absolute  tests  of  merit  to  all  literary 
work,  and  as  the  final  authority  on  all  doubtful 
matters  of  taste. 

Now,  Jeffrey  was  the  inheritor  of  this  tradition 
in  criticism,  and  naturally  adopted  at  times  its 
tyrannical  tone  and  manner  towards  public  and 
authors.  Yet,  following  his  temperamental  fond- 
ness for  compromises,  for  middle  parties  and  medi- 
ating measures,  Jeffrey  never   tried   formally  to 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  15 

defend  this  old  doctrine  or  represented  himself  as 
an  absolute  lawgiver  in  literature.  Nowhere  does 
he  lay  down  a  complete  set  of  principles,  like  the 
rules  of  Bossu  for  epic  poetry,  or  those  of  Rapin 
for  the  drama,  by  which  excellence  in  any  form  of 
literature  may  be  absolutely  tested.  Such  a  high- 
and-dry  Tory  theory  of  criticism  does  not  suggest 
itself,  to  Jeffrey  as  tenable.  He  is  a  Whig  in  taste 
as  in  politics,  and  desires  in  both  spheres  the 
supremacy  of  a  chosen  aristocracy.  In  his  essay 
on  Scott's  Lady  of  the  Lake  he  declares  the  stand- 
ard of  literary  excellence  to  reside  in  "  the  taste  of 
a  few  .  .  .  persons,  eminently  qualified,  by  natural 
sensibility  and  long  experience  and  reflection,  to 
perceive  all  beauties  that  really  exist,  as  well  as  to 
settle  the  relative  value  and  importance  of  all  the 
different  sorts  of  beauty."  Jeffrey  regards  himself 
as  one  of  the  choicest  spirits  of  this  chosen  aris- 
tocracy, and  it  is  as  the  exponent  of  the  best  cur- 
rent opinion  that  he  speaks  on  all  questions  of 
taste. 

It  follows  that,  when  Jeffrey  is  dealing  with 
purely  literary  questions,  he  is  less  argumentative 
than  at  other  times,  and  that  what  has  been  said  of 
his  viewing  every  subject  in  the  light  of  general 
principles  is  least  applicable  to  his  dogmatic  essays 
on  literature.  When,  for  example,  he  attacks 
Wilhelm  Meister  or  the  Excursion,  he  does  so  sim- 
ply and  frankly  in  terms  of  his  temperament. 
Wordsworth's  mysticism  baffles  him,  and  he  con- 


16  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

demns  it;  Goethe's  sordid  realism  and  sentiment 
offend  his  man-of-the-world  taste  and  he  anathe- 
matizes them.  His  custom  in  such  hostile  criti- 
cisms is  to  let  his  own  taste  masquerade  as  that  of 
"the  judicious  observer"  or  "the  modern  public." 
His  faith  in  his  own  personal  equation  is  unques- 
tioning and  devout.  Whatever  fails  to  fall  in  with 
his  bias  is  a  fair  mark  for  his  bitterest  invective. 
Goethe's  Wilhelm  Meister,  for  example,  is  "sheer 
nonsense,"  "ludicrously  unnatural,"  full  of  "pure 
childishness  or  mere  folly,"  "vulgar  and  obscure," 
full  of  "absurdities  and  affectations."  These 
terms  are,  for  the  most  part,  mere  circumlocutions 
for  Jeffrey's  dislike,  mere  roundabout  ways  of  say- 
ing that  the  book  is  not  to  his  taste.  As  for  com- 
ing to  an  understanding  with  author  or  reader  about 
the  ends  of  prose  fiction  or  the  best  methods  of 
reaching  those  ends,  Jeffrey  never  thinks  of  such 
an  attempt.  He  simply  takes  up  various  passages 
and  declares  he  does  not  comprehend  them,  or  does 
not  fancy  the  subjects  they  treat  of,  or  does  not 
like  the  author's  ideas  or  methods.  He  gives  no 
reasons  for  his  likes  or  dislikes,  but  is  content 
to  express  them  emphatically  and  picturesquely. 
This  is,  of  course,  dogmatism  pure  and  simple,  and 
a  dogmatism,  too,  more  irritating  than  the  dog- 
matism that  argues,  for  it  seems  more  arbitrary 
and  more  challenging.  Of  this  tone  and  method, 
Coleridge  complains  in  the  twenty-first  chapter  of 
his  Blographia  Literaria,  when,  in  commenting  on 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  17 

current  critical  literature,  he  protests  against  "  the 
substitution  of  assertion  for  argument "  and  against 
"  the  frequency  of  arbitrary  and  sometimes  petulant 
verdicts." 

But,  irritating  as  is  this  pragmatic,  unreasoning 
dogmatism,  it  is  nevertheless  plainly  a  step  for- 
ward from  the  view  that  makes  the  critic  absolute 
lawgiver  in  art.  As  the  Whig  position  in  politics 
is  midway  between  absolute  monarchy  and  de- 
mocracy, so  what  we  may  term  the  Whig  com- 
promise in  criticism  stands  midway  between  the 
tyranny  of  earlier  critics  and  our  modern  freedom. 
The  mere  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the  critic 
speaks  with  authority  only  as  representing  a  coterie, 
only  as  interpreting  public  opinion,  is  plainly  a 
change  for  the  better.  The  critic  no  longer  re- 
gards himself  as  by  divine  right  lord  alike  of  pub- 
lic and  authors;  he  no  longer  measures  literary 
success  solely  by  changeless,  abstract  formulas  of 
excellence;  he  admits  more  or  less  explicitly  that 
the  taste  of  living  readers,  not  rules  drawn  from 
the  works  of  dead  writers,  must  decide  what  in 
literature  is  good  or  bad.  He  still,  to  be  sure, 
limits  arbitrarily  the  circle  whose  taste  he  regards 
as  a  valid  test;  but  it  is  plain  that  a  new  principle 
has  implicitly  been  accepted,  and  that  the  way  is 
opened  for  the  development  and  recognition  of  all 
kinds  of  beauty  and  power  the  public  may  require. 

Jeffrey  himself,  however,  seems  never  to  have 
suspected  the  conclusions  that  might  legitimately 


18  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

be  drawn  from  the  ideas  that  he  was  helping  to 
make  current.  He  seems  to  have  had  no  qualm  of 
doubt  touching  his  right  to  dogmatize  on  the  merits 
and  defects  of  art  as  violently  as  a  critic  of  the 
older  school.  In  theory,  he  held  that  all  artistic 
excellence  is  relative;  but  in  practice,  he  never  let 
this  doctrine  mitigate  the  severity  of  his  judg- 
ments. He  asserts  in  his  review  of  Alison  on 
Taste  that  "what  a  man  feels  distinctly  to  be 
beautiful,  is  beautiful  to  him";  and  that  so  far  as 
the  individual  is  concerned  all  pleasure  in  art 
is  equally  real  and  justifiable.  Yet  this  doctrine 
seems  never  to  have  paralyzed  in  the  least  his  faith 
in  the  superior  worth  of  his  own  kind  of  pleasure; 
and  he  upbraids  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  just  as 
indignantly  for  not  ministering  to  that  pleasure, 
as  if  he  had  some  abstract  standard  of  poetic 
excellence,  of  which  he  could  prove  they  fell 
short. 

When  we  try  to  define  Jeffrey's  taste  and  to  de- 
termine just  what  he  liked  and  disliked  in  litera- 
ture, we  find  an  odd  combination  of  sympathies 
and  antipathies.  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  has  spoken 
of  him  as  in  politics  an  eighteenth-century  sur- 
vival;1 but  this  formula,  apt  as  it  is  for  his  poli- 
tics, scarcely  applies  to  his  taste  in  literature. 
The  typical  eighteenth-century  man  of  letters  was 
a  pseudo-classicist;  and  beyond  the  pseudo-classi- 
cal point  of  view  Jeffrey  had  passed,  just  as  cer- 

1  Hours  in  a  Library,  III,  176. 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  19 

tainly  as  lie  had  never  reached  the  Romantic  point 
of  view.  Of  Pope,  for  example,  he  says:  he  is 
"  much  the  best  we  think  of  the  classical  Conti- 
nental school;  but  he  is  not  to  be  compared  with 
the  masters  —  nor  with  the  pupils  —  of  that  Old 
English  one  from  which  there  had  been  so  lamen- 
table an  apostasy."  Addison  he  condemns  for  his 
"extreme  caution,  timidity,  and  flatness,"  and  he 
declares  that  "the  narrowness  of  his  range  in 
poetical  sentiment  and  diction,  and  the  utter  want 
either  of  passion  or  of  brilliancy,  render  it  diffi- 
cult to  believe  that  he  was  born  under  the  same 
sun  with  Shakespeare."  These  opinions  are  proof 
patent  of  Jeffrey's  contempt  for  pseudo-classicism. 
Then,  too,  Jeffrey  is,  as  he  himself  boasts,  almost 
superstitious  in  his  reverence  for  Shakespeare. 
More  significant  still  is  his  admiration  for  other 
Elizabethan  dramatists,  like  Beaumont,  Fletcher, 
Eord,  and  Webster.  "  Of  the  old  English  drama- 
tists," he  assures  us  in  his  essay  on  Ford,  "  it  may 
be  said,  in  general,  that  they  are  more  poetical, 
and  more  original  in  their  diction,  than  the  drama- 
tists of  any  other  age  or  country.  Their  scenes 
abound  more  in  varied  images,  and  gratuitous  ex- 
cursions of  fancy.  Their  illustrations  and  figures 
of  speech  are  more  borrowed  from  rural  life,  and 
from  the  simple  occupations  or  universal  feelings 
of  mankind.  They  are  not  confined  to  a  certain 
range  of  dignified  expressions,  nor  restricted  to  a 
particular  assortment  of  imagery,  beyond  which  it 


20  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

is  not  lawful  to  look  for  embellishments."  Finally, 
he  even  commends  Coleridge's  great  favourite, 
Jeremy  Taylor,  as  enthusiastically  as  Coleridge 
himself  could  do:  "There  is  in  any  one  of  the 
prose  folios  of  Jeremy  Taylor,"  he  asserts,  "more 
fine  fancy  and  original  imagery' — 'more  brilliant 
conceptions  and  glowing  expressions  —  more  new 
figures,  and  new  applications  of  old  figures  — 
more,  in  short,  of  the  body  and  the  soul  of  poetry, 
than  in  all  the  odes  and  the  epics  that  have  since 
been  produced  in  Europe." 

Such  judgments  as  these  mark  Jeffrey  as,  at  any 
rate,  not  an  eighteenth-century  survival;  they  must 
be  duly  borne  in  mind  when  a  formula  is  being 
sought  for  his  literary  taste.  Fully  as  significant, 
though  in  a  different  way,  is  the  series  of  essays 
on  the  poet  Crabbe.  If  the  praise  of  the  Eliza- 
bethans seems  to  argue  an  almost  Romantic  bias  in 
Jeffrey  and  to  suggest  that  after  all  his  tastes  are 
very  like  those  of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  the 
Crabbe  essays  at  once  reveal  his  antipathy  to  the 
men  of  the  new  age  aud  show  how  far  he  is  from 
even  being  willing  to  allow  its  prophets  to  prophesy 
in  peace  and  obscurity. 

Throughout  his  praise  of  Crabbe,  Jeffrey  is  by 
implication  condemning  "Wordsworth;  nor  does  he 
confine  himself  to  this  roundabout  method  of  at- 
tacking Romanticism.  In  the  very  first  essay  on 
Crabbe  (1807),  he  turns  aside  from  his  subject  to 
ridicule   by   name,    "the   Wordsworths,    and    the 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  21 

Southeys,  and  Coleridges,  and  all  that  ambitions 
fraternity,"  and  contrasts  at  great  length  Crabbe's 
sanity  with  Wordsworth's  mysticism.  "Mr. 
Crabbe  exhibits  the  common  people  of  England 
pretty  much  as  they  are  " ;  whereas  "  Mr.  Words- 
worth and  his  associates  .  .  .  introduce  us  to 
beings  whose  existence  was  not  previously  sus- 
pected by  the  acutest  observers  of  nature ;  and  ex- 
cite an  interest  for  them  —  where  they  do  excite 
any  interest  —  more  by  an  eloquent  and  refined 
analysis  of  their  own  capricious  feelings,  than  by 
any  obvious  or  intelligible  ground  of  sympathy  in 
their  situation."  With  Crabbe,  Jeffrey  feels  he 
is  on  solid  ground,  dealing  with  a  man  who  sees 
life  clearly  and  sensibly,  as  he  himself  sees  it;  and 
in  his  enthusiastic  praise  of  the  minute  fidelity  of 
Crabbe,  of  his  uncompromising  truth  and  realism, 
and  of  his  freedom  from  all  meretricious  effects, 
from  affectation,  and  from  absurd  mysticism,  we 
have  at  once  the  measure  of  Jeffrey's  poetic  sensi- 
bility and  the  sure  evidence  of  his  inability  to 
sympathize  genuinely  with  "the  Lakers." 

Of  course,  for  the  classic  passages  expressing  his 
impatience  of  the  new  movement,  we  must  go  to 
the  essays  on  Wordsworth's  Excursion  and  WJiite 
Doe.  Jeffrey's  objections  to  the  Lakers  fall  under 
four  heads :  First,  the  new  poets  are  nonsensically 
mystical ;  secondly,  they  falsify  life  by  showing  it 
through  a  distorting  medium  of  personal  emotion, 
i.e.  they  are  misleadingly  subjective;  thirdly,  they 


22  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

are  guilty  of  grotesque  bad  taste  in  their  demo- 
cratic realism;  fourthly,  they  are  pedantically 
earnest  and  serious  in  their  treatment  of  art,  and 
inexcusably  pretentious  in  their  proclamation  of  a 
new  gospel  of  life.  Mysticism,  intense  individu- 
ality of  feeling,  naturalism,  and  "high  serious- 
ness, "  —  these  were  the  qualities  that  in  the  new 
art  particularly  exasperated  Jeffrey ;  and  inasmuch 
as  these  were  the  very  qualities  to  which,  in  the 
eyes  of  its  devotees,  the  new  art  owed  its  special 
potency,  the  division  between  Jeffrey  and  the  Eo- 
manticists  was  sufficiently  deep  and  irreconcilable. 
Wordsworth's  transcendentalism,  his  intense 
spiritual  consciousness,  his  inveterate  fashion  of 
apprehending  all  nature  as  instinct  with  spiritual 
force  and  of  converting  "this  whole  Of  suns  and 
worlds  and  men  "  and  "  all  that  it  inherits  "  into  a 
series  of  splendid  imaginative  symbols  of  moral  and 
spiritual  truth,  — these  qualities  of  Wordsworth's 
genius  were  for  his  admirers  among  his  most  char- 
acteristic sources  of  power,  and  tended  to  place  him 
as  an  imaginative  interpreter  of  life  far  above  those 
Elizabethan  writers  whom  Jeffrey,  too,  in  opposition 
to  the  eighteenth  century,  pretended  to  reverence. 
But  these  were  just  the  qualities  in  Wordsworth's 
genius  that  seemed  to  Jeffrey  most  reprehensible. 
After  quoting  a  typical  passage  where  Words- 
worth's transcendentalism  finds  free  utterance, 
Jeffrey  exclaims:  "This  is  a  fair  sample  of  that 
rapturous  mysticism  which  eludes  all  comprehen- 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  23 

sion,  and  fills  the  despairing  reader  with  painful 
giddiness  and  terror."  Jeffrey's  woe  is  by  no 
means  feisrned.  We  cannot  doubt  that  his  whole 
mental  life  was  perturbed  by  such  of  Wordsworth's 
poems  as  the  great  Ode,  and  that  it  was  an  act  of 
self-preservation  on  his  part  to  burst  into  indig- 
nant ridicule  and  violent  protest.  To  find  a  man 
of  Wordsworth's  age  and  literary  experience  de-  f 
liberately  penning  such  bewildering  stanzas  and 
expressing  such  unintelligible  emotions,  shook  for 
the  moment  Jeffrey's  faith  in  his  own  little,  well- 
ordered  universe,  and  then,  as  he  recovered  from 
his  earthquake,  escaped  from  its  vapours,  and  felt 
secure  once  more  in  the  clear,  every-day  light  of 
common  sense,  led  him  into  fierce  invective  against 
the  cause  of  his  momentary  panic. 

Hardly  less  impatient  is  Jeffrey  of  Words- 
worth's subjectivity  than  of  his  mysticism.  Why 
cannot  Wordsworth  feel  about  life  as  other  people 
feel  about  it,  as  any  well-bred,  cultivated  man  of 
the  world  feels  about  it?  When  such  a  man  sees 
a  poor  old  peasant  gathering  leeches  in  a  pool,  he 
pulls  out  his  purse,  gives  him  a  shilling,  and  walks 
on,  speculating  about  the  state  of  the  poor  law; 
Wordsworth,  on  the  contrary,  bursts  into  a  strange 
fit  of  raving  about  Chatterton  and  Burns,  and 
"mighty  poets  in  their  misery  dead,"  and  then  in 
some  mysterious  fashion  converts  the  peasant's 
stolidity  into  a  defence  against  these  gloomy 
thoughts.     This  way  of  treating  the  peasant  seems 


24  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

to  Jeffrey  utterly  unjustifiable,  both  because  of  its 
grotesque  mysticism,  and  because  it  thrusts  a  per- 
sonal motif  discourteously  into  the  face  of  the  pub- 
lic and  falsifies  ludicrously  the  peasant's  character 
and  life.  Wordsworth  has  no  right,  Jeffrey  in- 
sists, to  treat  the  peasant  merely  as  the  symbol  of 
his  own  peculiar  mood.  Here,  as  in  his  protest 
against  Wordsworth's  mysticism,  Jeffrey  pleads 
for  common  sense  and  the  commonplace ;  he  is  the 
type  of  what  Lamb  calls  "the  Caledonian  intel- 
lect," which  rejects  scornfully  ideas  that  cannot 
be  adequately  expressed  in  good  plain  terms,  and 
grasped  "by  twelve  men  on  a  jury." 

Crabbe's  superiority  to  the  Lakers  lies  for  Jef- 
frey chiefly  in  the  fact  that  he  has  no  idiosyn- 
crasies, though  he  has  many  mannerisms;  he 
expresses  no  new  theories  and  no  peculiar  emo- 
tions in  his  portrayal  of  common  life.  Hence  his 
choice  of  vulgar  subjects  is  endurable  —  even 
highly  commendable.  His  peasants  are  the  well- 
known  peasants  of  every-day  England,  with  whose 
hard  lot  it  behoves  an  enlightened  Whig  to  sym- 
pathize—  from  a  distance.  But  a  realism  that, 
like  Wordsworth's,  professes  to  find  in  these  poor 
peasants  the  deepest  spiritual  insight  and  the 
purest  springs  of  moral  life,  is  simply  for  Jef- 
frey grotesque  in  its  maladroitness  and  confusion 
of  values.  Sydney  Smith  used  to  say,  "If  I  am 
doomed  to  be  a  slave  at  all,  I  would  rather  be  the 
slave  of  a  king  than  a  cobbler."     And  this  same 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  25 

prejudice  against  any  topsy-turvy  reassignment  of 
values  was  largely  responsible  for  Jeffrey's  dislike 
of  Wordsworth's  peasants  and  of  his  treatment  of 
common  life.  If  peasants  keep  their  places,  as 
Crabbe's  peasants  do,  they  may  perfectly  well  be 
brought  into  the  precints  of  poetry;  but  to  exalt 
them  into  types  of  moral  virtue  and  into  heavenly 
messengers  of  divine  truth,  is  to  "  make  tyrants  of 
cobblers."  Jacobinism  in  art,  as  in  politics,  is  to 
Jeffrey  detestable. 

In  fact,  all  the  pretensions  of  the  new  school 
to  illustrate  by  its  art  a  new  gospel  of  life  were 
intensely  disagreeable  to  Jeffrey.  As  long  as  1 
Komanticism  seemed  chiefly  decorative,  as  in  Scott 
or  Keats,  Jeffrey  could  tolerate  it  or  even  delight 
in  it.  But  the  moment  it  began,  whether  in  Byron 
or  Wordsworth,  to  take  itself  seriously,  and  to 
struggle  to  express  new  moral  and  spiritual  ideals,  J 
Jeffrey  protested.  Just  here  lies  the  key  to  what 
some  critics  have  found  a  rather  perplexing  prob- 
lem, —  the  reasons  for  the  varying  degrees  of  Jef- 
frey's sympathy  with  the  poets  of  his  day.  Let  the 
poet  remain  a  mere  master  of  the  revels,  or  a  mere 
magician  calling  up  by  his  incantations  in  verse  a 
gorgeous  phantasmagoria  of  sights  and  sounds  for 
the  delectation  of  idle  readers,  and  Jeffrey  will 
consent  to  admire  him  and  will  commend  his  fer-  » 
tility  of  invention,  his  wealth  of  imagination,  his 
"rich  lights  of  fancy,"  and  "his  flowers  of  poetry." 
Keats's  luxuriant  pictures  of  Greek  life  in  Endym- 


26  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

ion,  Jeffrey  finds  irresistible  in  the  "intoxication 
of  their  sweetness "  and  in  "  the  enchantments 
which  they  so  lavishly  present."  Moore  and  Camp- 
bell, he  regards  as  the  most  admirable  of  the  Eo- 
manticists,  and  their  works  as  the  very  best  of  the 
somewhat  extravagant  modern  school.  Writing  in 
1829,  he  arranges  recent  poets  in  the  following 
order,  according  to  the  probable  duration  of  their 
fame':  "The  tuneful  quartos  of  Southey  are 
already  little  better  than  lumber :  —  and  the  rich 
melodies  of  Keats  and  Shelley,  —  and  the  fantas- 
tical emphasis  of  Wordsworth,  —  and  the  plebeian 
pathos  of  Crabbe,  are  melting  fast  from  the  field 
of  our  view.  The  novels  of  Scott  have  put  out  his 
poetry.  Even  the  splendid  strains  of  Moore  are 
fading  into  distance  and  dimness  .  .  .  and  the 
blazing  star  of  Byron  himself  is  receding  from  its 
place  of  pride.  .  .  .  The  two  who  have  the  long- 
est withstood  this  rapid  withering  of  the  laurel 
.  .  .  are  Kogers  and  Campbell;  neither  of  them, 
it  may  be  remarked,  voluminous  writers,  and  both 
distinguished  rather  for  the  fine  taste  and  consum- 
mate elegance  of  their  writings,  than  for  that  fiery 
passion,  and  disdainful  vehemence,  which  seemed 
for  a  time  to  be  so  much  more  in  favour  with  the 
public."  Now  a  glance  at  Jeffrey's  list  of  poets 
makes  it  clear  that  those  for  whom  he  prophesies 
lasting  fame  are  either  pseudo-classicists  or  decora- 
tive Eomanticists,  and  that  those  whose  day  he  de- 
clares to  be  over  are  for  the  most  part  poets  whose 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  27 

Romanticism  was  a  vital  principle.  Eogers  is,  of 
course,  a  genuine  representative  of  the  pseudo- 
classical  tradition,  with  all  its  devotion  to  form, 
its  self-restraint,  its  poverty  of  imagination,  and 
its  distrust  of  passion.  Moore,  whom  Jeffrey  places 
late  in  his  list  of  fading  luminaries,  and  Campbell, 
whom  he  finds  most  nearly  unchanging  in  lustre, 
are  both  in  a  way  Romanticists ;  but  they  are  alike 
in  seeking  chiefly  for  decorative  effects  and  in  not 
taking  their  art  too  seriously.  So  long,  then,  as 
the  fire  and  the  heat  of  Romanticism  spent  them- 
selves merely  in  giving  imaginative  splendour  to 
style,  Jeffrey  could  tolerate  the  movement,  and 
could  even  regard  it  with  favour,  as  a  return  to 
that  power  and  fervour  and  wild  beauty  that  he  had 
taught  himself  to  admire  in  Elizabethan  poetry. 
Bat  the  moment  the  new  energy  was  suffered  to 
penetrate  life  itself  and  to  convert  the  conventional 
world  of  dead  fact,  through  the  vitalizing  power  of 
passion,  into  a  genuinely  new  poetic  material,  then 
Jeffrey  stood  aghast  at  what  seemed  to  him  a  re- 
turn to  chaos.  Byron  with  his  fiery  bursts  of  self- 
ish passion,  Wordsworth  with  his  steadily  glowing 
consciousness  of  the  infinite,  and  Shelley  with  his 
"white  heat  of  transcendentalism,"  were  all  alike 
for  Jeffrey  portentously  dangerous  forces  and  un- 
healthy phenomena. 

For  the  most  part,  in  his  attacks  upon  Romantic 
poetry,  Jeffrey  indulges  in  little  philosophizing; 
he  is  content  with  wit,  satire,  epigram,  and  clever 


28  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

self-assertion.  And  yet,  in  the  last  analysis,  there 
is  a  vital  connection  between  his  rejection  of  Ro- 
manticism and  his  abstract  theorizings  on  beauty, 
—  small  pains  as  he  has  taken  to  bring  out  this 
obscure  relationship.  A  complete  account  of  his 
temperament  and  taste  ought  to  show  how  the  same 
instincts  that  led  to  his  hostility  to  Wordsworth 
and  Coleridge  expressed  themselves  formally,  and 
tried  to  justify  themselves,  through  the  theory  of 
Beauty  which  he  worked  out  with  Alison's  help. 

According  to  Jeffrey's  account  of  the  matter,  a 
beautiful  object  owes  its  beauty  to  its  power  to  call 
up  in  the  observer  latent  past  experiences' of  pleas- 
ure and  pain.  These  little  fragments  of  past  joy 
and  sorrow  gather  closely  round  the  object  and  blend 
in  a  kind  of  blurred  halo  of  delight  which  we  call 
beauty.  Suppose  that  an  observer  looks  out  upon 
a  luxuriant  country  landscape;  the  winding  road 
calls  back  to  him  (though  without  his  conscious 
recognition  of  the  fact)  leisurely  afternoon  drives ; 
the  green  meadows  suggest  (again  obscurely)  past 
sympathy  with  shepherds  and  grazing  flocks  and 
rustic  prosperity;  the  cottages  surreptitiously 
wake  memories  of  home  joys  and  content  about 
the  hearthstone.  And  so  the  imagination  garners 
out  of  the  summer  landscape  a  myriad  evanescent 
associations  with  past  life,  which,  too  slight  and 
swift  to  be  detected  separately  by  thought,  never- 
theless unite  like  the  harmonics  of  a  musical  note 
to   produce   the   peculiar   character   that   we   call 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  29 

beauty.  This  being  the  nature  of  beauty,  it  fol- 
lows that  every  individual's  past  will  limit  and 
create  for  him  his  beauty  in  the  present;  his  fore- 
gone pleasures  and  pains  will  alone  make  possible 
those  echoes  of  intense  feeling  which  in  the  present 
combine  into  the  single  chord  of  beauty.  Accord- 
ing to  every  man's  past,  then,  is  his  present  sense 
of  beauty ;  and  as  no  two  men  have  the  same  past, 
no  two  men  can  have  the  same  perceptions  of 
beauty  in  the  present. 

Jeffrey  accepts  unhesitatingly  the  conclusions 
involved  in  this  doctrine,  and  asserts  that  beauty 
is  wholly  relative;  that  whatever  seems  to  a  man 
beautiful  is  for  him  beautiful;  and  that  no  sensible 
debate  is  possible  over  the  legitimacy  of  the  beauty 
that  a  man's  special  temperament  manufactures. 
So  long  as  a  man  confines  himself  to  enjoying 
beauty,  he  remains  beyond  criticism  in  the  magic 
region  of  his  own  private  experience.  But  the 
moment  he  offers  himself  as  a  creator  or  interpreter 
of  beauty  for  others,  he  must  take  into  account  the 
scope  and  nature  of  common  experience  and  try  to 
appeal  imaginatively  to  associations  which  are 
likely  to  be  in  the  hearts  of  all.  This  is  precisely, 
Jeffrey  once  or  twice  implies,  what  Romanticists 
like  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  failed  to  do.  They 
tried  to  impose  on  the  public  their  own  curiously 
whimsical  associations  of  pleasure  and  pain;  they 
were  incredibly  presumptuous  in  their  belief  that 
their  own  quaint,  country-side  blisses  and  sorrows 


30  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

and  their  own  droll  exaltations  and  despairs  over 
peddlers  and  beggars  and  leech-gatherers  must 
have  universal  value  for  mankind.  Here  for  Jef- 
frey lay  the  wilful  and  colossal  egotism  of  Eoman- 
tic  art ;  and  once  more  we  find  him  posing  as  the 
foe  of  idiosyncrasy  and  arbitrary  whim,  and  as 
the  representative  of  a  cultivated  aristocracy  of 
intelligence  and  social  experience  and  taste,  who, 
after  all,  have  something  like  a  common  fund  of 
feelings  and  associations  on  which  art  can  draw. 

As  for  the  actual  worth  of  Jeffrey's  theory  of 
beauty,  its  fault  lies  in  trying  to  stretch  into  a 
universal  formula  what  is  really  only  a  partial  ex- 
planation of  the  facts.  The  beauty  that  Jeffrey 
lays  stress  on  —  the  kind  of  beauty  that  comes  from 
the  suggestiveness  of  objects  —  is  duly  recognized 
nowadays  under  the  name  of  beauty  of  expression. 
The  possible  origin  of  beauty  through  association 
of  ideas  had  not  been  thoroughly  considered 
before  the  days  of  Jeffrey  and  Alison,  and  their 
work  was  therefore  new  and  historically  important. 
But  beside  beauty  that  comes  from  this  source,  — 
beside  beauty  of  expression,  —  there  are  beauty  of 
form  and  beauty  of  material;  neither  of  these  is 
recognized  by  Jeffrey  as  an  independent  variety, 
and  examples  of  each  he  tries,  with  really  heroic 
ingenuity,  to  reduce  to  beauty  of  expression.  The 
beauty  of  a  Greek  temple  is  explained  as  depending 
solely  on  a  swift,  unconscious  recognition  of  the 
stability,  costliness,  splendour,  and   antiquity  of 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  31 

the  structure.  The  beauty  of  special  colours  or  of 
chords  of  music  is  derived,  not  at  all  from  the  in- 
trinsic quality  of  the  sensations,  — the  hue  or  the 
musical  sound, — but  wholly  from  subtle  associa- 
tions with  past  pleasure  and  pain.  Thus  Jeffrey's 
theory  becomes  distorted  and  misleading  in  spite 
of  the  truthfulness  of  much  of  his  observation 
and  the  real  subtlety  and  acuteness  of  many  of 
his  interpretations.  The  quintessential  in  art,  the'' 
pleasure  that  art  gives  through  pure  form  and  the 
inexplicable  ministry  of  sensation,  Jeffrey  is  least 
sensitive  to,  and  is  continually  looking  askance  at 
and  trying  to  forget  or  to  account  for  as  merely 
disguised  human  sympathy. 

Besides  the  light  it  throws  on  Jeffrey's  quarrel 
with  Romanticism,  his  theory  of  beauty  is  of 
special  significance  because  it  emphasizes  the  genu- 
ineness and  intensity  of  his  ethical  interest.  All 
artistic  pleasure  is  for  Jeffrey  merely  human  sym- 
pathy in  masquerade  —  past  love  for  one's  fel- 
lows, delicately  revived  in  the  music  of  art.  The 
only  man,  then,  who  can  have  a  wide  range  of 
artistic  pleasure  is  he  who  in  the  past  has  shared 
generously  in  the  lives  of  his  comrades.  Holding 
this  theory  of  art,  Jeffrey  in  his  literary  criticism 
naturally  laid  great  stress  on  the  ethical  qualities 
of  books  and  authors.  Accordingly,  in  the  preface 
to  his  Collected  Essays,  Jeffrey  claims  special  credit 
for  his  frequent  use  of  the  ethical  point  of  view. 
"  If  I  might  be  permitted  farther,  to  state,  in  whax 


32  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

particular  department,  and  generally,  on  account 
of  what,  I  should  most  wish  to  claim  a  share  of 
those  merits,  I  should  certainly  say,  that  it  was  by 
having  constantly  endeavoured  to  combine  Ethical 
precepts  with  Literary  Criticism,  and  earnestly 
sought  to  impress  my  readers  with  a  sense,  both 
of  the  close  connection  between  sound  intellectual 
attainments  and  the  higher  elements  of  duty  and 
enjoyment;  and  of  the  just  and  ultimate  subor- 
dination of  the  former  to  the  latter.  The  praise, 
in  short,  to  which  I  aspire,  and  to  merit  which  I 
am  conscious  that  my  efforts  were  most  constantly 
directed,  is,  that  I  have,  more  uniformly  and 
earnestly  than  any  preceding  critic,  made  the  Moral 
tendencies  of  the  works  under  consideration  a  lead- 
ing subject  of  discussion." 

This  "proud  claim,"  as  Jeffrey  calls  it,  seems 
amply  justified  when  we  compare  Jeffrey's  essays 
either  with  the  critical  essays  in  the  earlier  Eeviews, 
or  with  the  more  formal  and  elaborate  critical  es- 
says of  the  eighteenth  century.  Even  Dr.  Johnson 
with  all  his  didacticism  had  little  notion  of  extract- 
ing from  a  piece  of  literature  the  subtle  spirit  of 
good  or  of  evil  by  which  it  draAvs  men  this  way  or 
that  way  in  conduct.  An  obvious  infringement  of 
good  morals  in  speech  or  in  plot  he  was  sure  to 
condemn,  and  a  formal  inculcation  of  moral  truth 
he  was  sure  to  recognize  and  approve.  But  neither 
in  Johnson,  nor  anywhere  else  before  Jeffrey,  do 
we  find  a  critic  constantly  attempting  to   detect 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  33 

and  define  the  moral  atmosphere  that  pervades 
the  whole  work  of  an  author,  and  to  determine  the 
relation  between  this  moral  atmosphere  and  the 
author's  personality  as  man  and  as  artist.  To 
have  perceived  the  value  of  this  ethical  criticism, 
to  have  practised  it  skilfully,  and  to  have  fostered 
a  taste  for  it,  these  are  true  claims  to  distinction; 
and  Jeffrey's  services  in  these  directions  have  been 
too  often  forgotten.  The  greater  breadth  of  view 
of  later  critics  and  their  surer  appreciation  of  ethi- 
cal values  should  not  be  allowed  to  deprive  Jeffrey 
of  his  honour  as  a  pioneer  in  ethical  criticism. 

For  still  another  innovation  in  critical  methods, 
Jeffrey  was  at  least  partly  responsible.  He  was 
among  the  earliest  English  critics  to  see  the  im- 
portance for  the  study  of  literature  of  the  histori- 
cal point  of  view  and  to  take  into  close  account,  in 
the  study  of  an  author  or  of  a  whole  literature,  the 
social  environment.  Not  that  Jeffrey  was  one  of 
the  original  minds  who  first  conceived  of  the  his- 
torical method  of  study  in  its  application  to  art, 
and  worked  out  for  themselves  conceptions  of  lit- 
erature as  a  growth  and  development  and  as  de- 
pendent upon  the  spirit  of  the  age  and  upon  social 
conditions.  Jeffrey,  it  can  hardly  be  doubted, 
was  merely  a  clever  borrower.  Long  before  his 
,day,  the  principles  underlying  the  historical  con- 
ception of  literature  had  been  worked  out  in  Ger- 
many, and  had  been  applied  by  Herder  and  Goethe, 
and  their  disciples,   for  the  solution  of  problems 


34  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

in  criticism.  Of  this  German  theorizing  Jeffrey 
can  hardly  have  had  direct  knowledge.  But  to 
Madame  de  Stael,  who  was  an  adept  in  German 
speculation,  Jeffrey  probably  owed  much,  —  both 
to  her  teaching  and  to  her  example.  Her  De  la 
literature  consider  ee  dans  ses  rapports  avec  les  insti- 
tutions sociales  had  appeared  in  France  in  1800,  and 
her  De  VAllemagne,  a  study  of  German  life  and 
literature  conceived  throughout  in  strict  harmony 
with  the  principles  of  the  historical  method,  was 
published  in  1810.  Now  it  is  in  1811  that  an  un- 
mistakable broadening  of  method  may  be  discerned 
in  Jeffrey's  literary  criticism.  His  essay  on  Ford's 
Dramatic  Works  (August,  1811)  is  remarkable  for 
its  rapid  survey  of  the  whole  development  of 
English  literature,  its  brilliant  generalizations  as 
regards  the  characteristics  of  such  definite  periods 
as  that  of  the  Restoration,  and  its  fairly  successful 
attempts  to  account  for  these  characteristics  as  the 
outcome  in  each  case  of  the  social  conditions  of  the 
time.  Before  1811,  or  at  any  rate  before  1810, 
Jeffrey  never  gets,  in  his  study  of  an  author,  beyond 
the  biographical  point  of  view.  He  may  consider 
psychological  questions,  —  the  characteristics  of 
an  author's  mind  that  have  impressed  themselves 
on  his  book,  or  the  nature  of  the  public  taste  to 
which  literature  of  a  certain  kind  caters.  But 
the  sociological  origin  of  a  literary  school  or  a 
writer  has  not  before  that  time  troubled  Jeffrey. 
After  the  Ford  essay  the  historical  and  the  socio- 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  35 

logical  points  of  view  are  used  rather  frequently, 
though  it  must  be  admitted  with  uncertain  success 
and  not  with  entire  loyalty. 

Perhaps  Jeffrey's  most  interesting  actual  discus- 
sion of  the  historical  method  occurs  in  the  intro- 
duction to  his  essay  on  Wilhehn  Meister,  written  in 
1825.  In  this  introduction  he  tries  to  classify  the 
influences  that  mould  literature  and  guide  its  de- 
velopment, and  his  formulas  are  curiously  sugges- 
tive of  the  much  later  and  rather  famous  theorizinsr 
of  the  French  critic,  Taine.  Jeffrey  does  not  rec- 
ognize race  —  the  first  of  Taine's  forces;  "human 
nature,"  Jeffrey  asserts,  "is  everywhere  funda- 
mentally the  same."  But  for  Taine's  two  other 
sets  of  forces  which  he  groups  under  the  names 
moment  and  milieu,  close  equivalents  may  be  found 
in  Jeffrey's  formulas.  "The  circumstances,"  he 
asserts,  "which  have  distinguished  [literature] 
into  so  many  local  varieties  .  .  .  may  be  divided 
into  two  great  classes,  —  the  one  embracing  all 
that  relates  to  the  newness  or  antiquity  of  the 
society  to  which  they  belong,  or,  in  other  words,  to 
the  stage  which  any  particular  nation  has  attained 
in  that  progress  from  rudeness  to  refinement,  in 
which  all  are  engaged;  the  other  comprehending 
what  may  be  termed  the  accidental  causes  by  which 
the  character  and  condition  of  communities  may  be 
affected;  such  as  their  government,  their  relative 
position  as  to  power  and  civilization  to  neighbour- 
ing countries,  their  prevailing  occupations,  deter- 


36  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

mined  in  some  degree  by  the  capabilities  of  their 
soil  and  climate."  Of  these  principles,  Jeffrey  goes 
on  through  a  half-dozen  paragraphs  to  make  more 
special  application;  he  describes  certain  kinds  of 
literature,  or  certain  characteristics  of  literature, 
that  are  apt  to  correspond  to  certain  stages  of  civi- 
lization; he  considers  hastily  some  of  the  qualities 
impressed  upon  literature  by  different  sorts  of 
political  institutions.  All  this  general  discussion, 
though  decidedly  in  the  air,  is  true  and  suggestive; 
it  shows  that  by  1825  Jeffrey  had  a  good  deal  of 
insight  into  the  general  theory  of  the  dependence 
of  literature  on  society.  It  must  not  be  forgotten, 
however,  in  estimating  Jeffrey's  originality,  that 
even  in  England  Coleridge  and  Hazlitt  had,  for  a 
good  many  years  before  the  date  of  this  Withelm 
Meister  essay,  been  applying  the  historical  method 
with  insight  and  power  for  the  explanation  of 
literary  problems. 

In  point  of  fact,  Jeffrey  is  usually  much  more 
impressive  when  he  talks  abstractly  about  the  his- 
torical method  than  when  he  tries  to  apply  it 
specifically.  He  is  specially  apt  to  be  unhistorical 
when  he  treats  of  the  beginnings  either  of  litera- 
ture or  of  institutions.  He  lacked  the  knowledge 
of  facts  which  alone  could  render  possible  a  fruit- 
ful historical  conception.  His  construction  of 
early  periods  is  always  a  priori  in  terms  of  a  cheap 
psychology.  His  account,  in  the  essay  on  Leckie, 
of  the  origin  of  government,  should  be  compared 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  37 

with,  his  description  of  the  earliest  attempts  at 
poetic  composition.  In  both  cases  he  has  a  great 
deal  to  say  about  what  "  it  was  natural "  for  the 
earliest  experimenters  in  each  kind  of  work  to  aim 
at  and  to  effect,  and  substantially  nothing  to  say 
of  the  actual  facts  as  determined  by  investigation. 
Moreover,  these  earliest  experimenters  are  for 
Jeffrey  marvellously  like  eighteenth-century  con- 
noisseurs, confronting  consciously,  and  trying  to 
solve  reflectively,  intricate  problems  in  art  or  in 
politics.  This  view  is,  of  course,  unhistorical, 
and  illustrates  the  difficulty  Jeffrey  had  in  escap- 
ing from  old  ways  of  thought. 

Finally,  Jeffrey  never  applies  the  historical 
method  successfully  to  the  study  of  any  contem- 
porary piece  of  literature.  In  the  essay  on  Wil- 
helm  Meister,  for  example,  the  general  account  of 
the  principles  that  underlie  historical  criticism  is 
fluent  and  clear;  but  the  change  is  abrupt  and 
disastrous  when  Jeffrey  turns  to  the  particular 
discussion  of  Goethe's  novels.  Far  from  being 
historical  or  scientific,  or  trying  to  trace  out  in 
Goethe's  work  the  significant  forces  that  were 
shaping  contemporary  German  life,  Jeffrey  merely 
gives  himself  over  to  railing  at  whatever  jars  on 
his  personal  taste.  In  short,  half  the  essay  is 
scientific  and  half  purely  dogmatic,  and  the  two 
halves  have  scarcely  any  logical  connection.  Sad 
to  say,  Jeffrey  nearly  always  bungled  or  faltered 
like  this  when  trying  to  use  the  historical  method, 


\ 


38  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

particularly  when  trying  to  interpret  the  literature 
of  his  own  time.  Other  instances  of  his  short- 
sightedness or  clumsiness  are  to  be  found  in  his 
treatment  of  Byron  and  Wordsworth.  He  missed 
entirely  the  meaning  of  Byron's  savage  revolt 
against  the  conventionalism  of  eighteenth- century 
moral  ideals,  and  he  was  equally  unable  to  under- 
stand Wordsworth's  high  conservatism.  Perhaps 
the  most  damaging  accusation  that  can  be  brought 
against  Jeffrey,  as  a  critic,  is  inability  to  read  and 
interpret  the  age  in  which  he  lived. 

Jeffrey's  imperfect  grasp  of  the  historical 
method  is  shown  in  one  other  way:  he  never 
realized  that  there  was  any  conflict  between  his 
work  as  a  dogmatic  critic  and  his  work  as  a  scien- 
tific student  of  literature,  or  had  a  premonition  of 
the  blighting  effect  that  the  spread  of  historical 
conceptions  of  literature  was  ultimately  to  have  on 
the  prestige  of  the  dogmatic  critic.  More  and 
more,  since  Jeffrey's  day,  criticism  has  concerned 
itself  with  the  scientific  explanation  and  the  inter- 
pretation of  literature;  less  and  less  has  it  posed 
as  the  ultimate  science  of  right  thinking  and  right 
doing  in  literary  art.  This  change  has  been 
brought  about  partly  by  the  Romantic  movement 
with  its  fostering  of  individualism  in  art,  and  partly 
through  the  development  of  historical  conceptions 
in  all  departments  of  thought.  Both  these  forces 
were  in  full  play  during  Jeffrey's  life,  and  of  neither 
did  he  at  all  measure  the  scope  or  significance. 


FEANCIS   JEFFREY  39 

Regarded,  then,  from  a  modern  point  of  view, 
Jeffrey,  as  a  literary  critic,  takes  shape  somewhat 
as  follows :  As  an  appreciator  he  is  sadly  to 
seek,  owing  largely  to  over-intellectualism  and 
disputatiousness.  As  a  dogmatic  critic  he  is  even 
yet  thoroughly  readable  because  of  his  dashing 
style,  his  deft  and  ready  handling,  his  shrewd 
common  sense,  and  his  sincerity;  he  expressed 
brilliantly  the  tastes  and  antipathies  of  a  large 
circle  of  cultivated  people  of  considerable  social 
distinction,  who,  while  not  peculiarly  artistic  or 
literary,  read  widely  and  intelligently,  and  felt 
keenly  and  delicately,  though  within  a  somewhat 
limited  range.  Even  in  his  dogmatic  criticism, 
however,  his  faults  are  obvious;  his  dogmatism  is 
peremptory;  his  tone,  often  bitter;  and  his  preju- 
dices are  as  scarlet.  On  the  other  hand,  for  giving 
a  strong  ethical  trend  to  literary  criticism,  he 
deserves  all  honour.  His  social  sympathies  were 
intense  and  alert;  they  fixed  the  character  of  his 
whole  theory  of  beauty,  and  continually  expressed 
themselves  in  his  comments  upon  books  and  au- 
thors. Through  his  persistently  ethical  interpre- 
tations of  literature,  he  really  enlarged  the  borders 
of  literary  criticism.  As  for  his  historical  criti- 
cism, it  cannot  be  said  to  have  much  permanent 
value.  Into  the  general  theory  on  which  the  use 
of  the  historical  method  rests,  Jeffrey  shows  con- 
siderable insight ;  but  he  was  by  nature  and  by 
training  a  dogmatist,  not  a  scientific  student  of 


40  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

fact.  Though  his  theorizings  led  him  to  believe 
speculatively  in  the  relativity  of  beauty,  and 
though  he  recognized  abstractly  that  literature 
must  vary  from  age  to  age  as  the  time-spirit  varies, 
yet  he  rarely  let  these  convictions  affect  his  tone 
or  method  in  the  treatment  of  literature;  he  is  as 
round  and  intolerant  in  his  blame  of  Addison  or 
Pope  as  if  he  had  never  been  within  seeing  dis- 
tance of  the  historical  point  of  view.  In  short, 
the  disinterestedness  of  science  was  foreign  to 
Jeffrey's  nature;  he  was  primarily  and  distinc- 
tively, not  an  investigator  or  interpreter,  but  a 
censor  bent  on  praise  or  blame. 

These  very  characteristics  of  his  criticism,  how- 
ever, were  of  a  kind  to  bring  Jeffrey,  in  1803, 
great  glory.  With  some  disguise  until  1809,  when 
the  Tory  Quarterly  Revieio  was  founded,  unclis- 
guisedly  thereafter,  Jeffrey  was  the  great  Whig 
champion  in  all  that  pertained  to  letters.  From  a 
partisan  critic,  audacious  and  brilliant  dogmatism 
was  just  what  was  sure  to  win  the  widest  hearing. 
Moreover,  in  accounting  for  Jeffrey's  enormous 
popularity,  the  trashiness  and  insipidity  of  earlier 
review-writing  must  be  kept  in  mind.  Reviewing 
had  been  the  pet  occupation  of  Grub  street ;  penny- 
a-liners  had  impressed  upon  criticism  all  their  own 
unloveliness  and  feebleness ;  review  articles  seemed 
to  issue  from  under-fed,  torpid  brains  and  anaemic 
bodies.  Jeffrey's  reviewing  was  the  very  incarna- 
tion of  health,  vigour,  and  prosperity. 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  41 

Finally,  Jeffrey  profited  in  name  and  fame  more 
than  it  is  easy  now  to  compute  from  the  happy  op- 
portuneness of  a  new  literary  form,  a  literary  form 
that  was  made  possible  through  the  establishment 
of  the  Edinburgh  Review.  This  Review  differed 
in  many  of  its  business  arrangements  and  in  its 
mode  of  publication  from  preceding  Reviews;  it 
was  established  in  accordance  with  a  new  concep- 
tion of  the  scope  of  review-writing,  and  of  the 
relation  of  reviewers  to  the  public.  As  the  result 
of  this  new  conception  and  these  new  relations, 
literary  criticism,  which  had  hitherto  been  merely 
more  or  less  ingenious  talk  about  technical  matters, 
was  transformed  into  the  earnest  and  vigorous  dis- 
cussion of  literature  as  the  expression  of  all  that 
was  significant  and  absorbing  in  the  life  of  the 
time.  And  as  still  further  results  of  the  new 
policy,  reviewing  and  reviewers  came  into  hitherto 
unknown  honour;  the  Edinburgh  Review  was  adored 
or  was  hated  and  feared  throughout  the  length  and 
breadth  of  the  land,  and  Jeffrey  was  universally 
regarded  as  demonic  in  his  versatility,  brilliancy, 
penetration,  and  vigour.  Much  of  Jeffrey's  great 
prestige  as  a  critic  must  be  set  down  as  due  to  his 
having  long  stood  as  the  visible  symbol  of  the  suc- 
cess of  the  new  style  of  reviewing. 

IV 

The  story  of  the  foundation  of  the  Edinburgh 
Review  has  been  told  so  often  as  hardly  to  bear 


42  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

repeating.  Enough  of  the  facts,  however,  must  be 
gone  over  again  to  make  clear  the  change  that  the 
new  periodical  wrought  in  reviewing  and  in  the 
relations  between  critics  and  the  public. 

The  classical  account  of  the  origin  of  the  Review 
is  Sydney  Smith's  and  is  to  be  found  in  the  Preface 
to  his  collected  Works;  it  has  been  reproduced  in 
Lord  Cockburn's  Life  of  Jeffrey l  and  in  the  Life 
and  Times  of  Lord  Brougham.'  With  his  usual 
crabbedness  Brougham  disputes  a  few  minor  de- 
tails, but  he  leaves  the  substantial  accuracy  of 
"  Sydney's  "  story  unimpeached. 

The  idea  of  the  new  Review  was  Sydney  Smith's. 
The  most  important  conspirators  were  Sydney, 
Jeffrey,  Francis  Horner,  and  Brougham.  The 
plot  was  discussed  and  matured  in  Jeffrey's  house 
in  Buccleuch  Place,  Edinburgh.  Sydney  Smith's 
famous  proposal  of  a  motto,  Tenui  musam  medi- 
tamur  avena,  "We  cultivate  literature  on  a  little 
oatmeal,"  was  rejected;  the  "sage  Horner's"  sug- 
gestion was  adopted,  —  a  line  from  Publius  Syrus, 
Judex  damnaticr  cum  nocens  absolvitur,  which  fore- 
told the  righteous  severity  of  tone  that  was  to  char- 
acterize the  Revieiv.  The  first  number  was  to  have 
appeared  in  June,  1802,  but,  owing  to  dilatory  con- 
tributors and  Jeffrey's  faintheartedness,  was  seri- 

1  Lord  Cockburn's  Life  of  Jeffrey  (ed.  Philadelphia,  1852), 
I,  101  ff. 

2  The  Life  and  Times  of  Lord  Brougham  (ed.  New  York, 
1871),  I,  176  ff. 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  43 

ously  delayed ;  it  finally  appeared  in  October,  1802, 
under  the  supervision  of  Sydney  Smith.  After 
the  publication  of  the  first  number  Jeffrey  was 
formally  appointed  editor,  and,  with  some  hesita- 
tion, accepted  the  post. 

The  success  of  the  Review  was  from  the  start 
beyond  all  expectation.  "The  effect,"  says  Lord 
Cockburn,  "  was  electrical.  And  instead  of  expir- 
ing, as  many  wished,  in  their  first  effort,  the  force 
of  the  shock  was  increased  on  each  subsequent  dis- 
charge. It  is  impossible  for  those  who  did  not 
live  at  the  time,  and  in  the  heart  of  the  scene,  to 
feel,  or  almost  to  understand  the  impression  made 
by  the  new  luminary,  or  the  anxieties  with  which 
its  motions  were  observed."  Lord  Brougham's 
account  of  the  matter  is  no  less  emphatic.  "  The 
success  was  far  beyond  any  of  our  expectations.  It 
was  so  great  that  Jeffrey  was  utterly  dumbfounded, 
for  he  had  predicted  for  our  journal  the  fate  of  the 
original  Edinburgh  Review,  which,  born  in  1755, 
died  in  1756,  having  produced  only  two  num- 
bers !  The  truth  is,  the  most  sanguine  among  us, 
even  Smith  himself,  could  not  have  foreseen  the 
greatness  of  the  first  triumph,  any  more  than  we 
could  have  imagined  the  long  and  successful  career 
the  Review  was  afterwards  to  run,  or  the  vast  re- 
forms and  improvements  in  all  our  institutions, 
social  as  well  as  political,  it  was  destined  to  effect." 
The  subscription  list  of  the  Review  grew  within 
six  years  from  1750  to  9000;  and  by  1813  it  num- 


44  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

bered  more  than  12,000.  The  importance  of  these 
figures  will  be  better  understood  when  the  reader 
recollects  that  in  1816  the  London  Times  sold  only 
8000  copies  daily.  Moreover,  it  should  be  remem- 
bered that  one  copy  of  a  magazine  went  much 
further  then  than  it  goes  now,  and  did  service  in 
more  than  a  single  household.  In  1809  Jeffrey 
boasted  that  the  Review  was  read  by  50,000  think- 
ing people  within  a  month  after  it  was  printed; 
doubtless  this  was  a  perfectly  sound  estimate. 

Various  causes  have  been  suggested  as  contribut- 
ing to  the  instant  and  phenomenal  success  of  the 
Review,  — the  puzzling  anonymity  of  its  articles, 
its  magisterial  tone,  the  audacity  of  its  attacks, 
what  Horner  calls  its  "scurrility,"  the  novelty  of 
its  Scotch  origin.     All  these  causes  doubtless  had 
their   influence.     More   important  still,   however, 
Avere  the  wit,  the  knowledge,  and  the  originality  of 
the  brilliant  contributors  that  Jeffrey  rallied  round 
him.     Writing  to  his  brother  in  July,  1803,  Jef- 
frey thus  describes  his  fellow-workers :  "  I  do  not 
think  you  know  any  of  my  associates.     There  is 
the  sage  Horner,  however,  whom  you  have  seen, 
and  who  has  gone  to  the  English  bar  with  the  reso- 
lution of  being   Lord   Chancellor;    Brougham,    a 
great  mathematician,    who   has   just   published  a 
book  upon  the  Colonial  Policy  of  Europe,  which 
all   you    Americans    should    read;    Eev.    Sydney 
Smith  and  P.  Elmsley,  two  Oxonian  priests,  full 
of  jokes  and  erudition;  my  excellent  little  Sanscrit 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  45 

Hamilton,  who  is  also  in  the  hands  of  Bonaparte 
at  Fontainebleau ;  Thomas  Thomson  and  John 
Murray,  two  ingenious  advocates;  and  some  dozen 
of  occasional  contributors,  among  whom  the  most 
illustrious,  I  think,  are  young  Watt  of  Birming- 
ham and  Davy  of  the  Boyal  Institution."  J  Many 
of  these  names  are  now  forgotten,  but  those  of 
Sydney  Smith,  Brougham,  Horner,  and  Davy  speak 
for  themselves  and  are  guarantees  of  brilliancy 
of  style,  originality  of  treatment,  and  vigorous 
thought. 

The  editor  and  the  contributors,  then,  must  re- 
ceive their  full  share  of  credit  for  the  success  of  the 
new  Review ;  but  their  ability  alone  can  hardly  ac- 
count for  a  success  that  converted  the  "  blue  and 
yellow  "  into  a  national  institution.  To  explain  a 
success  so  permanent  and  far-reaching,  we  must 
look  beyond  editor  and  contributors  and  consider 
the  relation  of  the  Review)  to  its  social  environ- 
ment. The  Edinburgh  Review  came  into  being  in 
answer  to  a  popular  need;  it  developed  a  new  lit- 
erary form  to  meet  this  need ;  and  its  business  ar- 
rangements were  such  as  enabled  the  cleverest  and 
most  suggestive  writers  to  adapt  their  work  to  the 
requirements  of  the  reading  public  more  readily 
and  more  effectively  than  ever  before.  The  mean- 
ing of  these  assertions  will  grow  clearer  as  we  con- 
sider the  difference  between  the  Edinbxirgh  Review 
and  earlier  English  Reviews. 

1  Lord  Cockbum's  Life  of  Jeffrey,  II,  64. 


40  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 


Prior  to  1802  there  were  two  standard  Reviews 
in  Great  Britain,  —  the  Monthly  Review  and  the 
Critical  Review.  Minor  Reviews  there  had  been  in 
plenty,  of  longer  or  shorter  life;  but  these  two 
periodicals  had  pushed  beyond  their  competitors 
and  were  regarded  as  the  best  of  their  kind.  The\ 
Monthly  Review  had  been  founded  in  1749  by  Ralph 
Griffiths,  a  bookseller;  it  was  Whig  in  politics  and 
Low  Church  in  religion.  Its  rival,  the  Critical 
Review,  of  which  Smollett  was  for  many  years 
editor,  had  been  founded  in  1756,  and  was  Tory 
and  High  Church.  These  Reviews  were  alike  in 
form  and  in  ostensible  aim;  they  were  published 
monthly,  were  made  up  of  unsigned  articles  of 
moderate  length,  and  professed  to  give  competent 
accounts  of  the  qualities  of  all  new  books.  But 
though  thus  apparently  worthy  predecessors  of  the 
great  Reviews  with  which  nineteenth-century 
readers  are  familiar,  they  were  really  quite  unlike  ' 
,thein  in  general  policy,  in  scope  and  style,  and  in 
influence.  They  were  merely  booksellers'  organs, 
under  the  strict  supervision  of  booksellers,  and 
often  edited  by  booksellers.  They  were  used  per- 
sistently and  systematically,  though,  of  course, 
discreetly,  to  further  the  bookseller's  business 
schemes,  to  quicken  the  sale  in  case  of  a  slow 
market,  and  to  damage  the  publications  of  rivals. 
They  were  written  for  the  most  part  by  drudges 


FEANCIS   JEFFREY  47 

and  penny-a-liners,  who  worked  under  the  orders 
of  the  bookseller  like  slaves  under  the  lash  of  the 
slave-driver.  These  characteristics  of  the  older 
Reviews  may  be  best  illustrated  by  a  brief  account 
of  the  methods  in  accordance  with  which  Griffiths, 
the  editor  of  the  Monthly,  conducted  his  Review, 
and  by  some  choice  anecdotes  of  his  treatment  of 
subordinates. 

Griffiths  was  originally  a  bookseller;  and,  though 
he  was  able  later  to  retire  from  this  business  and 
to  devote  himself  wholly  to  the  management  of  his 
Review,  he  retained  still  the  instincts  of  a  petty 
tradesman,  and  kept  his  eye  on  the  state  of  the 
market  like  a  skilful  seller  of  perishable  wares. 
Of  scholarship,  of  genuine  taste,  and  literary 
ability  he  had  next  to  nothing ;  but  he  had  shrewd 
common  sense,  sound  business  instincts,  tact  in 
dealing  with  men,  readiness  to  bully  or  to  fawn  as 
might  be  needful,  and  unlimited  patience  in  schem- 
ing for  the  commercial  success  of  his  venture. 

His  dealings  with  Goldsmith  between  1755  and 
1765,  and  with  William  Taylor  of  Norwich  be- 
tween 1790  and  1800,  illustrate  his  narrow  policy 
in  the  conduct  of  the  Monthly  and  his  tyranny 
towards  contributors.  Goldsmith,  he  by  turns  bul- 
lied and  bribed  according  as  poor  Goldsmith  was 
more  or  less  in  need  of  money.  On  one  occasion 
he  became  Goldsmith's  security  with  his  tailor 
for  a  new  suit  of  clothes  on  condition  that  Gold- 
smith at  once  write  four  articles  for  the  Revieiv; 


48  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

these  articles  were  turned  out  to  order,  and  ap- 
peared in  December,  1758.  On  Goldsmith's  fail- 
ing to  pay  his  tailor's  bill  in  the  specified  time, 
Griffiths  demanded  the  return  of  the  suit  and  also 
of  the  books ;  and  when  he  found  that  Goldsmith 
had  pawned  the  books,  he  wrote  him  abusively, 
terming  him  sharper  and  villain,  and  threatening 
him  with  jail.  In  1759,  on  the  appearance  of  Gold- 
smith's first  book,  Griffiths  ordered  one  of  his 
hacks,  the  notorious  Kenrick,  to  ridicule  the  work, 
and  to  make  a  personal  attack  on  the  author. 
These  orders  were  faithfully  carried  out  in  the  next 
number  of  the  Monthly  Revieiv.1 

With  William  Taylor  of  Norwich  Griffiths  took 
a  very  different  tone.  Taylor  was  one  of  the  few 
men  of  breeding  and  of  parts  who,  before  1802, 
condescended  to  write  for  Reviews,  and  he  was 
moreover  for  many  years  the  great  English  au- 
thority on  German  literature.  For  these  reasons, 
Griffiths  always  used  him  with  the  utmost  tender- 
ness, and,  even  when  giving  him  orders  or  refusing 
his  articles,  took  a  flattering  tone  of  deference  and 
admiration.  On  one  occasion  Taylor  demanded  an 
increase  of  pay;  Griffiths's  answer  gives  a  very 
instructive  glimpse  of  the  relations  between  the 
bookseller-editor  and  his  hack-writers.  The 
"gratuity"  for  review  work,  Griffiths  assures  Tay- 
lor, had  been  settled  fifty  years  before  at  two 
guineas  a  sheet  of  sixteen  printed  pages,  "  a  sum 

1  Forster's  Goldsmith  (ed.  London,  1848),  p.  170. 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  49 

not  then  deemed  altogether  puny,"  and  in  the  case 
of  most  writers  had  since  remained  unchanged, 
although  there  had  been  certain  "allowed  excep- 
tions in  favour  of  the  most  difficult  branches  of  the 
business."  These  exceptions,  however,  had  tended 
to  cause  much  jealousy  and  heart-burning  among 
the  contributors;  for  "it  could  not  be  expected 
that  those  labourers  in  the  vineyard,  who  cus- 
tomarily executed  the  less  difficult  branches  of  the 
culture,  would  ever  be  cordially  convinced  that 
their  merits  and  importance  were  inferior  to  any." 
After  these  laborious  explanations  Griffiths  agrees 
to  raise  Taylor's  compensation  to  three  guineas  per 
sheet  of  sixteen  printed  pages,  though  he  expressly 
points  out  that  by  so  doing  he  risks  "exciting 
jealousy  in  the  corps,  similar,  perhaps,  to  what 
happened  among  the  vine-dressers,  Matt.,  chap, 
xx."  "  If  objections  arise,"  he  shrewdly  continues, 
"  we  must  resort  for  consolation  to  a  list  of  can- 
didates for  the  next  vacancy,  for  in  the  literary 
harvest  there  is  never  any  want  of  reapers."1 
Griffiths's  slave-driving  propensities  show  clearly 
through  the  thin  disguise  of  politic  words.  Plainly 
he  feels  himself  absolute  master  of  the  minds  and 
wills  of  an  indefinite  number  of  penny-a-liners; 
and  it  is  on  these  penny-a-liners  that  he  resolves 
to  depend  for  the  great  mass  of  his  articles. 

The  evil  influence  of  the  publisher's  despotism 
ran  through  the  Review  and  vitiated  all  its  judg- 

i  J.  W.  Robberd's  Life  of  William  Taylor,  I,  130-132. 

E 


50  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

ments.  The  editor-publisher  prescribed  to  his 
hacks  what  treatment  a  book  should  receive. 
Sometimes  this  was  with  a  view  to  the  market. 
"I  send  also  the  Horce  Bibilicce  at  a  venture," 
writes  Griffiths  to  Taylor,  "...  it  signifies  not 
much  whether  we  notice  it  or  not,  as  it  is  not  on 
sale."1  The  italics  are  Griffiths's  own.  Some- 
times, the  publisher-editor  merely  wanted  to 
favour  a  friend  or  injure  an  enemy.  Griffiths's 
dictation  in  the  case  of  Goldsmith's  first  book 
has  already  been  noted.  On  another  occasion 
Griffiths  sent  a  copy  of  Murphy's  Tacitus  to  Tay- 
lor with  the  following  significant  suggestion: 
"  One  thing  I  have  to  mention,  entre  nous,  that 
Mr.  M.  is  one  of  us,  and  that  it  is  a  rule  in  our 
society  for  the  members  to  behave  with  due  de- 
corum toward  each  other,  whenever  they  appear  at 
their  own  bar  as  authors,  out  of  their  own  critical 
province.  If  a  kingdom  (like  poor  France  at 
present)  be  divided  against  itself,  'how  shall  that 
kingdom  stand'?"2  If  Griffiths  ventured  on  this 
dictation  with  a  man  of  Taylor's  standing  and  in- 
dependence, his  tyranny  over  his  regular  depend- 
ents must  have  been  complete  and  relentless. 

As  a  result,  review-writing  became  purely  hack- 
work. The  reviewer  had  no  voice  of  his  own  in 
his  criticism;  what  little  individuality  he  might, 
in  his  feebleness,  have  put  into  his  work,  had  he 

i  J.  W.  Robberd's  Life  of  William  Taylor,  I,  139. 
-  Ibid.,  I,  122. 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  51 

been  left  to  himself,  disappeared  under  the  eye 
of  his  taskmaster.  He  became  a  mere  machine, 
praising  and  blaming  perfunctorily  and  conven- 
tionally, at  the  bidding  of  the  editor-publisher. 
Mawkish  adulation  or  random  abuse  became  the 
staple  of  critical  articles ;  and  in  neither  kind  of 
work  did  the  critic  rise  above  the  dead  level  of 
hopeless  mediocrity. 

A  final  result  of  this  whole  system  of  review- 
managing  and  hack-writing  was  unwillingness  on 
the  part  of  men  of  position  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  review-writing.  If  a  man  criticised  books  in 
a  Eeview,  he  felt  that  he  was  putting  himself  on  a 
level  with  Kenrick,  Griffiths 's  notorious  hireling, 
who  had  been  imprisoned  for  libel,  with  Kit  Smart, 
who  had  bound  himself  to  a  bookseller  for  ninety- 
nine  years,  and  with  other  like  wretches.  William 
Taylor  of  jSTorwich  was  one  of  the  few  gentlemen  >^ 
who,  before  1802,  ventured  to  write  for  Reviews.  6 

With  the  establishment  of  the  Edinburgh  Review 
all  this  was  changed.  The  prime  principle  of  the 
new  Review  was  independence  of  booksellers.  The 
plan  was  not  a  bookseller's  scheme,  but  was 
the  outcome  of  the  ambitious  fervour  of  half  a 
dozen  young  adventurers  in  law,  literature,  and 
politics.  From  the  start  the  bookseller  was  a 
"mere  instrument,"  as  Brougham  specially  notes. 
The  management  of  the  Review  was  at  first  in  the 
hands  of  Sydney  Smith.  When  he  set  out  for 
London  his  last  words  to  the  publisher,  Constable, 


52  FKANCIS  JEFFREY 

were,  "If  you  will  give  £200  per  annum  to  your 
editor  and  ten  guineas  a  sheet,  you  will  soon  have 
the  best  Review  in  Europe."  Accordingly,  the 
editorship  was  at  once  offered  to  Jeffrey,  at  even  a 
higher  salary,  £300,  than  Sydney  Smith  had 
named.  Jeffrey  hesitated  because  of  "  the  risk  of 
general  degradation."  But  he  found  the  £300  "a 
monstrous  bribe";  moreover,  the  other  contribu- 
tors were  all  planning  to  take  their  ten  guineas  a 
sheet ;  accordingly,  after  many  qualms,  he  swal- 
lowed his  scruples  and  became  a  paid  editor. 
"The  publication,"  he  wrote  to  his  brother,  in 
July,  1803,  "is  in  the  highest  degree  respectable 
as  yet,  as  there  are  none  but  gentlemen  connected 
with  it.  If  it  ever  sink  into  the  ordinary  book- 
seller's journal,  I  have  done  with  it." 

So  began  Jeffrey's  "reign"  of  twenty-six  years; 
and  so  ended  the  despotism  of  booksellers.  Hence- 
forth the  editor,  not  the  publisher,  was  master. 
It  was  Jeffrey  who  decided  what  books  should  be 
handled,  or  rather  what  subjects  should  be  dis- 
cussed; it  was  Jeffrey  who  determined  the  price  to 
be  paid  for  each  article, — "I  had,"  he  declares, 
"  an  unlimited  discretion  in  this  respect " ;  it  was 
Jeffrey  who  pleaded  with  the  dilatory,  mollified 
the  refractory,  and  reached  out  here  and  there  after' 
new  contributors;  in  short,  it  was  Jeffrey  who 
shaped  the  policy  of  the  Review  and  impressed  on 
it  its  distinctive  character. 

But  there  were  several  other  hardly  less  important 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  53 

points  in  which  the  business  policy  of  the  Edinburgh 
was  a  new  departure.  The  pay  for  reviewing  was 
greatly  increased.  The  old  price  had  been  two 
guineas  a  sheet  of  sixteen  printed  pages;  the  Edin- 
burgh Revieio,  after  the  first  three  numbers,  paid  ten 
guineas  a  sheet,  and  very  soon  sixteen  guineas. 
Moreover,  this  was  the  minimum  rate;  over  two- 
thirds  of  the  articles  were,  according  to  Jeffrey, 
"paid  much  higher,  averaging  from  twenty  to 
twenty-five  guineas  a  sheet  on  the  whole  number." 

Again,  every  contributor  was  forced  to  take  pay ; 
no  contributor,  however  nice  his  honour,  was  suf- 
fered to  refuse.  This  regulation  was  of  the  ut- 
most importance;  the  rule  salved  the  consciences 
of  many  brilliant  young  professional  men,  who  were 
glad  of  pay,  but  ashamed  to  write  for  it,  and  afraid 
of  being  dubbed  penny-a-liners.  By  Jeffrey's 
clever  arrangement  they  could  write  for  fame  or 
for  simple  amusement,  and  then  have  money 
"thrust  upon  them."  With  high  prices  and  en- 
forced compensation  the  new  Revieio  at  once  drew 
into  its  service  men  of  a  totally  different  stamp 
from  the  old  hack-writers. 

Finally,  the  Edinburgh  was  published  quarterly, 
whereas  the  old  Keviews  were  published  monthly. 
This  change  was  for  two  reasons  important :  in  the 
first  place,  writers  had  more  time  in  which  to  pre- 
pare their  articles  and  led  less  of  a  hand-to-mouth 
life  intellectually;  and,  in  the  second  place,  the 
Review  made  no  attempt  to  notice  all  publications, 


54  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

and  chose  for  discussion  only  books  of  real  signifi- 
cance. Coleridge  particularly  commends  this  part 
of  the  policy  of  the  Review :  "  It  has  a  claim  upon 
the  gratitude  of  the  literary  republic,  and,  indeed, 
of  the  reading  public  at  large,  for  having  origi- 
nated the  scheme  of  reviewing  those  books  only, 
which  are  susceptible  and  deserving  of  argumenta- 
tive criticism."1 

VI 

These,  then,  were  the  principal  points  in  which 
the  organization  and  policy  of  the  Edinburgh  Re- 
view contrasted  with  those  of  its  predecessors ;  and 
the  influence  of  these  changes  on  the  tone  and 
spirit  of  the  articles  in  the  new  Review  can  hardly 
be  exaggerated.  The  Edinburgh  Review  was  not 
a  catch-all  for  waste  information;  it  was  an  organ 
of  thought,  a  busy  intellectual  centre,  from  which 
the  newest  ideas  were  sent  out  in  a  perpetual 
stream  through  the  minds  of  sympathetic  readers. 
The  Review  had  opinions  of  its  own  on  all  public 
questions.  In  politics,  it  advocated  the  principles 
of  the  Constitutional  Whigs,  at  first  in  a  non- 
partisan spirit,  after  1808,  fiercely  and  aggres- 
sively ;  it  pleaded  for  reform  of  the  representation, 
for  Catholic  emancipation,  for  a  wise  recognition 
of  the  just  discontent  of  the  lower  classes,  and  for 
judicious  measures  to  allay  this  discontent  without 
violent  Constitutional  changes.    In  social  matters, 

i  Coleridge,  Biographia  Literaria,  chap.  21. 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  55 

it  urged  reforms  of  all  kinds,  the  repeal  of  the 
game-laws,  the  improvement  of  prisons,  the  pro- 
tection of  chimney-sweeps  and  other  social  unfort- 
unates. In  religion,  it  argued  for  toleration.  In 
education,  it  attacked  pedantry  and  tradition,  ridi- 
culed the  narrowness  of  university  ideals,  and 
contended  for  the  adoption  of  practical  methods 
and  utilitarian  aims.  In  all  these  departments  it 
criticised  the  existing  order  of  things,  always  brill- 
iantly and  suggestively,  and  sometimes  fiercely 
and  radically,  and  stirred  the  public  into  a  keener 
consciousness  and  more  intelligent  appreciation  of 
the  questions  of  the  hour,  social,  political,  and 
religious. 

Now  it  is  plain  that,  to  accomplish  all  this, 
writers  would  find  it  necessary  to  go  far  outside  of 
the  old  limits  of  book-reviewing,  and  to  make  their 
articles  express  their  own  independent  ideas  on 
various  important  topics,  rather  than  simply  their 
critical  opinions  of  the  merits  of  new  publications. 
And  this  is  precisely  what  happened.  A  book- 
review  became  in  most  cases  merely  a  mask  for  the 
writer's  own  ideas  on  some  burning  question  of  the 
hour.  In  other  words,  the  establishment  of  the  Ed- 
inburgh Revieiv  really  led  to  the  evolution  of  a  new 
literary  form ;  the  old-fashioned  review-article  was 
converted  into  a  brief  argumentative  essay  discuss- 
ing some  living  topic,  political  or  social,  in  the 
light  of  the  very  latest  ideas.  This  kind  of  essay 
had  been  unknown  in  the  eighteenth  century,  and 


56  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

was  developed  at  the  opening  of  the  nineteenth 
century  in  response  to  the  needs  of  the  moment. 

Nor  was  this  change  in  the  nature  of  the  review- 
article  unremarked  at  the  time ;  Hazlitt  noted  it, 
and  with  his  usual  sourness  protested  against  it. 
"If  [the  critic]  recurs,"  he  says,  "to  the  stipulated 
subject  in  the  end,  it  is  not  till  after  he  has  ex- 
hausted his  budget  of  general  knowledge ;  and  he 
establishes  his  own  claims  first  in  an  elaborate 
inaugural  dissertation  de  omni  scibili  et  quibusclam 
aliis,  before  he  deigns  to  bring  forward  the  preten- 
sions of  the  original  candidate  for  praise,  who  is 
only  the  second  figure  in  the  piece.  We  may 
sometimes  see  articles  of  this  sort,  in  which  no  al- 
lusion whatever  is  made  to  the  work  under  sentence 
of  death,  after  the  first  announcement  of  the  title- 
page."1  Coleridge,  on  the  other  hand,  approved 
of  the  change,  and  commended  the  "plan  of  sup- 
plying the  vacant  place  of  the  trash  or  mediocrity 
wisely  left  to  sink  into  oblivion  by  their  own 
weight,  with  original  essays  on  the  most  interest- 
ing subjects  of  the  time,  religious  or  political;  in 
which  the  titles  of  the  books  or  pamphlets  prefixed 
furnish  only  the  name  and  occasion  of  the  disquisi- 
tion."2 The  reviewers  themselves  recognized,  of 
course,  the  change  they  were  working,  though  they 
did  not  altogether  realize  its  significance.  In 
1807,  Horner  writes  Jeffrey,  "  Have  you  any  good 

1  Hazlitt's  Table  Talk,  2d  series,  essay  6. 

2  Coleridge's  Biographia  Literaria,  chap.  21.  * 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  57 

subjects  in  view  for  your  nineteenth?  There  are 
two  I  wish  you,  yourself,  would  undertake,  if  you 
can  pick  up  books  that  would  admit  of  them."  l 
This  quotation  illustrates  the  fact  that  the  impor- 
tant question  in  the  minds  of  the  reviewers  was 
always,  not  "What  new  books  have  appeared?" 
but  "What  topics  just  now  have  the  greatest 
actuality  and  are  best  worth  discussing?  " 

This,  then,  was  largely  the  cause  of  the  success 
of  the  Review:  it  offered,  in  its  articles,  a  literary 
form  by  means  of  which  the  most  active  and  origi- 
nal minds  could  at  once  come  into  communication 
with  "  the  intelligent  public  "  on  all  vital  topics ; 
it  made  the  best  thought  and  the  newest  knowledge 
more  readily  available  than  ever  before  for  readers 
who  were  every  day  becoming  more  alive  to  their 
value. 

The  times  were  plainly  favourable.  The  French 
Eevolution  had  stirred  men's  imaginations  as  they 
had  not  been  stirred  for  a  century,  and  had  shaken 
portentously  in  all  directions  the  foundations  of 
belief.  Traditions  in  politics,  in  social  organiza- 
tion, in  religion,  were  violently  assailed  by  men 
like  Godwin,  Home  Tooke,  and  Holcroft,  and 
loyally  defended  by  enthusiastic  conservatives. 
The  fever  of  Komanticism  was  already  making 
itself  felt  and  was  quickening  men's  hearts  to  new 
passions  and  firing  their  imaginations  with  new 
visions   of   possible   bliss.     The   air   was   full   of 

1  Memoirs  and  Correspondence  of  Horner,  I,  419. 


M 


58  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

questions  and  doubts,  of  eager  forecasts,  and  of 
ominous  warnings.  All  this  ferment  of  life  and 
feeling  demanded  freer  utterance  than  could  be 
found  through  old  literary  forms  and  with  old 
methods  of  publication. 

Moreover,  the  increasing  importance  of  the 
middle  class  and  the  spread  of  popular  education 
were  favourable  to  the  development  of  the  new 
literary  form.  The  number  of  men  who  read  and 
thought  for  themselves  had  been  rapidly  growing. 
These  men  were  not  scholars  or  deep  thinkers,  and 
had  no  leisure  to  puzzle  out  learned  treatises.  They 
were  overworked  professional  men  or  business 
men,  who  were  alive  to  the  questions  of  the  hour, 
who  had  thought  over  them  and  discussed  them 
wherever  and  whenever  they  could,  and  who  were 
anxious  for  guidance  from  "  men  of  light  and  lead- 
ing." The  essays  of  the  new  Review  gave  them 
just  what  they  wanted,  —  brief,  clear,  yet  original 
and  suggestive,  dissertations  by  the  best-trained 
minds  on  the  most  important  current  topics. 

These,  then,  are  some  of  the  causes,  over  and 
beyond  Jeffrey's  editorial  skill,  and  the  brilliancy 
and  originality  of  his  co-workers,  that  led  to  the 
unprecedented  success  of  the  Edinburgh  Review. 
Their  importance  and  their  significance  are  shown 
by  the  fact  that  within  a  few  years  several  other 
Reviews  were  founded  on  precisely  the  same  plan 
with  the  Edinburgh,  and  soon  rivalled  it  in  popu- 
lar favour.    In  1809  the  Tory  Quarterly  Review  was 


FRANCIS  JEFFREY  59 

started  with  William  Gilford  as  editor,  and  Scott, 
South ey,  Canning,  Ellis,  and  Croker  among  its 
contributors.  In  1820  the  Retrospective  Review  was 
established,  and  in  1824  the  Westminster  Review, 
the  organ  of  the  Radicals ;  Bentham  was  its  patron, 
Bowring  its  editor,  and  James  Mill  and  John 
Stuart  Mill  were  constant  contributors.  These 
Reviews  were  all  quarterlies,  and  in  the  details  of 
their  organization  were  modelled  after  the  famous 
Edinburgh.  They  all  found  a  ready  welcome,  and, 
with  the  exception  of  the  Retrospective,  have  con- 
tinued to  thrive  down  to  our  own  day. 

VII 

The  bearing  of  all  this  upon  the  history  of  Jef- 
frey's literary  reputation  must  be  fairly  obvious. 
Jeffrey  profited  from  the  conspiracy  of  a  great 
many  fortunate  circumstances,  and  for  a  series  of 
years  enjoyed,  as  dictator  of  the  policy  of  the 
Edinburgh  Review,  a  reputation  as  critic  that  was 
really  far  beyond  what  his  intrinsic  merit  justified. 
Leigh  Hunt  and  Lamb  were  much  more  delicate 
and  imaginative  appreciators  of  literature  than 
Jeffrey;  Hazlitt,  despite  his  waywardness  and 
arrogance,  was  a  subtler  and  more  stimulating  lit- 
erary interpreter.  Coleridge  was  incomparably 
Jeffrey's  superior  in  penetrating  insight,  in  learn- 
ing and  scholarship,  in  philosophic  scope,  and  in 
refinement   and   sureness  of   taste.     Yet  Jeffrey, 


60  FRANCIS   JEFFREY 

by  dint  of  his  cleverness,  versatility,  brilliancy, 
readiness  of  resource,  and,  above  all,  because  of 
his  commanding  position  as  the  director  of  the  new 
Whig  Review,  outstripped  all  these  competitors 
and  imposed  himself  on  public  opinion  as  the  typi- 
cally infallible  critic  of  his  day  and  generation. 
His  personal  charm,  too,  worked  in  his  favour;  his 
Whig  following  was  enthusiastically  loyal.  Every- 
thing tended  to  increase,  for  the  time  being,  his 
fame  as  a  literary  autocrat. 

The  later  reaction,  which  has  so  nearly  con- 
signed Jeffrey  to  the  region  of  unread  authors,  was 
v  in  its  turn  extreme,  and  yet  followed  naturally. 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  whom  Jeffrey  had  as- 
sailed persistently  till  he  had  become  in  the  public 
mind  the  representative  foe  of  Romanticism,  had 
won  their  cause,  and  been  received  by  wider  and 
Wider  circles  of  the  most  cultivated  and  discerning 
readers  as  among  the  foremost  poets  of  their  age. 
Jeffrey,  their  arch-enemy,  suffered  correspondingly 
in  public  esteem.  Time  seemed  to  have  proved 
him  wrong  in  one  of  his  most  strenuously  asserted 
prejudices.  Moreover,  this  particular  defeat  was 
merely  one  special  instance  of  the  evil  effect  that 
far-reaching  influences  were  having  upon  Jeffrey's 
reputation.  His  modes  of  conceiving  life  were 
being  outgrown.  His  genial,  man-of-the-world 
wisdom  and  somewhat  narrow  range  of  feeling 
seemed  more  and  more  unsatisfactory,  as  the  pub- 
lic gradually  made  their  own  the  deeper  spiritual 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  61 

experience  of  idealistic  poets,  like  Shelley,  and 
of  transcendental  prose-writers,  like  Carlyle.  Jef- 
frey's dry  intellectuality  and  liis  shallow  asso- 
ciational  psychology  seemed  unequal  to  the  vital 
problems  in  art  and  in  ethics  that  the  new  age  was 
canvassing.  Moreover,  his  autocratic  style  and 
omniscient  air  had  been  caught  up  by  all  the  quar-  ^  L_ 

terly  Reviews,  and  no  longer  served  to  distinguish 
him;  the  methods  and  the  tone  of  the  Edinburgh 
were  copied  far  and  wide,  and  the  critics  of  the 
new  generation  were  quite  a  match  for  Jeffrey  in 
gay,  domineering  assurance  and  in  easy,  swift  om- 
niscience. Jeffrey  had  trained  many  followers 
into  his  own  likeness ;  or,  at  any  rate,  the  methods 
and  the  tone  that  he  had  hit  upon  "  survived  "  and 
had  been  universally  received  as  fit. 

Finally,  Jeffrey's  essays,  even  at  their  best,  had 
many  of  the  qualities  of  u  occasional "  writing,  and 
too  often  seemed  merely  meant  for  the  moment; 
the  trail  of  the  periodical  was  over  them  all. 
Their  very  rapidity,  sparkle,  and  plausibility  gave 
them  an  air  of  perishableness;  they  seemed  clever 
and  entertaining  improvisations.  Work  of  this 
sort  could  hardly  hope  to  maintain  itself  perma- 
nently in  public  favour.  Nor  was  the  collection  of 
his  essays,  that  Jeffrey  saw  fit  to  publish  in  1843, 
of  a  sort  to  make  a  stand  against  the  general  in- 
difference that  was  clouding  his  fame.  Two  thou- 
sand pages  of  improvised  comments  on  all  manner 
of  topics,  from  the  Memoirs  of  Baber  to  Dugald 


? 


/ 


G2  FRANCIS  JEFFREY 

Stewart's  Philosophical  Essays,  could  scarcely  be 
expected  to  secure  a  fixed  place  for  themselves  iu 
the  affections  of  large  masses  of  readers.  A  far 
smaller  volume,  that  should  have  included  only 
the  essays,  or  portions  of  essays,  that  were  best 
wrought  in  style,  most  vigorously  thought  out,  and 
contained  the  most  characteristic  and  final  of  Jef- 
frey's opinions,  would  have  been  more  likely  —  ex- 
cept in  so  far  as  Jeffrey  based  his  claims  on  his 
versatility  —  to  have  insured  him  permanent  re- 
membrance as  critic  and  prose-writer. 

The  reaction,  then,  against  Jeffrey  was  necessary 
and,  in  some  degree,  just.  Yet,  now  that  the  air 
is  cleared  of  Romantic  prejudices,  Jeffrey's  real 
services  to  the  causes  both  of  criticism  and  of  sound 
literature  may  be  more  accurately  perceived  and 
defined.  Not  for  a  moment  can  the  student  who 
aims  at  genuine  insight  into  the  history  of  litera- 
ture and  of  literary  opinion  during  the  first  quarter 
of  our  century  afford  to  disregard  Jeffrey  and  his 
Edinburgh  Revieiv  Essays,  or  to  pass  him  by  with 
a  phrase  as  a  mere  unsuccessful  opponent  of 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge.  Jeffrey  influenced 
public  opinion  decisively  and  beneficially  on  a  vast 
range  of  subjects.  He  broadened  the  methods  of 
literary  criticism  and  won  for  it  new  points  of 
view  and  new  fields.  He  put  the  relations  be- 
tween critic  and  public  on  a  sounder  basis,  and 
raised  the  profession  of  literary  criticism  into  an 
honourable  calling.    Finally,  he  developed  English 


\ 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY  63 

style,  added  to  its  swiftness  of  play  and  brilliant 
serviceableness,  and  prepared  the  way  for  the 
dazzlingly  effective,  if  somewhat  mechanical,  tech- 
nique of  Macaulay.  All  these  good  works  are 
nowadays  too  often  forgotten;  and  on  the  injustice 
of  such  neglect  one  cannot  comment  more  aptly 
than  through  the  quotation  of  Jeffrey's  own 
famous  phrase  — "This  will  never  do." 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PKOSE-WKITER 

i 

In  these  "uncanonical  times,"  it  may  seem 
somewhat  grotesque  to  go  for  information  about 
an  author's  style  to  his  patron  saint.  Yet  no 
surer  way  exists  for  gaining  an  insight  into  the 
peculiar  charm  of  Cardinal  Newman's  writings 
than  through  an  appeal  to  St.  Philip  Neri,  the 
founder  of  the  Congregation  of  the  Oratory,  whom 
Newman  chose  for  his  "own  special  Father  and 
Patron."  In  at  least  two  of  his  discourses,  or  es- 
says, Newman  has  analyzed  the  character  and  pe- 
culiar influence  of  St.  Philip  Neri.  "Whatever 
was  exact  and  systematic,"  Newman  tells  us, 
"  pleased  him  not ;  he  put  from  him  monastic  rule 
and  authoritative  speech,  as  David  refused  the 
armour  of  his  king.  No;  he  would  be  but  an  ordi- 
nary individual  priest  as  others ;  and  his  weapons 
should  be  but  unaffected  humility  and  unpretend- 
ing love.  All  he  did  was  to  be  done  by  the  light, 
and  fervour,  and  convincing  eloquence  of  his  per- 
sonal character  and  his  easy  conversation."  In 
another  essay,  Newman  describes  St.  Philip's  dis- 
trust of  "  the  severity  of  the  Regular  "  as  a  means 

64 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  65 

for  the  control  of  those  whom  he  sought  to  sub- 
jugate. "Influence,"  adroit  intimacy,  winning 
intercourse,  these  were  the  means  by  which  St. 
Philip  preferred  to  work  on  those  about  him. 

Newman's  loving  regard  for  these  traits  of  StJ 
Philip's  genius  is  a  revelation  of  some  of  the  deep-l 
est  instincts  of  his  nature,  —  instincts  which  must  | 
at  once  be  brought  into  view  in  any  attempt  to  ap- 1 
preciate  his  style  as  a  writer  of  prose.     A  peculiar 
personal  charm  is  impressed  on  all  the  most  char- 
acteristic of  Newman's  prose-writings,  —  on  what- 
ever he  wrote  after  he  had,  as  an  artist,    found 
himself  and   realized   his   essential  genius.     Ab- 
stract as  his  subject  may  be,  he  gives  it  some  colour 
of  life  and  some  of  the  beauty  and  grace  of  friendly 
discourse.     Every  one  knows  what  charm  there  is 
in  the  talk  of  a  man  of  the  world  who  puts  before 
his  listeners,  in  picturesque  phrases,  the  variable 
incidents  of  actual  life  as  he  himself  has  encoun-j 
tered  them.     The  whim,  the  personal  idiom,  the 
glancing  humour,  the  concrete  image,  the  vivacious 
disorderliness,   the   skilful   dealing  at  first  hand 
with  glowing  human  experience,  give  to  talk  of 
this  sort  a  peculiarly  winning  quality.     And  the 
style  that  in  literature  mimics  afar  the  colloquial 
rhythms  and  the  idiom  of  such  familiar  talk  hap 
also,  its  peculiar  charm.     The  writer  seems  to  es- 
cape from  the  blank  region  of  authorship,  to  realize 
himself  before  the  reader  as  a  friendly  face  and 
form,   and  to  communicate  himself  through   the 


66  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

hundred  and  one  subtle  signs  of  eye  and  voice  and 
gesture  and  smile  that  give  to  actual  human  inter- 
course its  delight  and  stimulating  power.  The  ex- 
treme form  of  this  colloquial  style,  where  an  author 
is  merely  amiably  garrulous,  is  not  to  be  found  in 
Newman's  writings;  Newman's  temper  was,  after 
all,  too  academic  for  this,  and  his  subjects  were  too 
abstract  and  difficult.  Barely,  however,  have 
topics  as  speculative  as  are  many  of  Newman's 
been  treated  with  so  much  of  the  wayward  charm 
and  pliant  grace  of  friendly  discourse  as  Newman 
reaches.  His  style,  at  its  best,  has  the  urbanity,  ' 
the  affability,  the  winning  adroitness,  even  the 
half-careless  desultoriness  of  the  familiar  talk  of 
a  man  of  the  world  with  his  fellows. 

Yet  it  is  not  this  colloquial  grace  by  itself  that 
gives  to  Newman's  discussions  of  abstract  topics 
their  peculiar  distinction;  it  is  rather  his  recon- 
ciliation of  the  charm  of  colloquial  freedom  with 
the  demands  of  logical  method  and  thoroughness 
of  treatment.  Garrulity  to  no  purpose  is  usually 
easy  enough.  But  the  peculiarity  of  Newman's 
style  and  method  is  that,  with  all  their  apparent 
casualness,  they  lead  the  reader  to  a  complete  and 
essentially  logical  command  of  the  topic  under  dis- 
cussion. When  he  chose,  Newman  was  absolute 
master  of  the  severe  beauty  of  rational  discourse, 

—  of  the  beauty  of  that  kind  of  discourse  that  dis- 
dains to  follow  any  associations  save  those  of  logic, 

—  discusses  with  fine  economic  precision  just  the 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  67 

aspects  of  truth  that  right  reason  detects  as  essen- 
tial to  the  question  in  hand,  and  is  everywhere 
formally  correct,  systematic,  and  dignified.  His 
earliest  work  is  often  austerely  wrought  in  accord- 
ance with  this  ideal.  Ultimately,  however,  the 
essential  charm  that  made  him  so  winning  in  per- 
sonal intercourse  passed  over  into  his  prose,  and 
conveyed  into  it  the  warmth,  and  elasticity,  and 
colour  of  life.  Yet  this  change  involved  no  real 
sacrifice  of  structure  or  loss  of  firmness  in  the  text- 
ure of  his  thought.  And  for  the  trained  student  of 
literary  method  much  of  the  surpassing  charm  of 
Newman's  work  is  due  to  the  possibility  of  finding 
in  it,  on  analysis,  a  continual  victorious  union  of 
logical  strenuousness  with  the  grace  and  ease  and 
charm  of  a  colloquial  manner  and  idiom.  This 
victory  is  so  easily  won  as  to  seem  something  by 
the  way;  but  the  student  and  analyst  knows  that 
it  is  the  result  of  rare  tact,  finely  disciplined  in- 
stinct, exquisite  rhetorical  insight  and  foresight, 
and  extraordinary  luminousness  and  largeness  of 
thought. 

The  very  perfection  of  Newman's  rhetorical  man- 
ner has  exposed  him  to  some  unpleasant  charges 
of  insincerity.  It  is  not  strange  that  in  the  midst 
of  a  people  like  the  English,  who  are  perhaps  some- 
what affectedly  straightforward  and  pretentiously 
downright,  Newman  should,  now  and  then,  have 
suffered  for  his  adroitness  and  grace.  The  bluff, 
impetuous  man  is  proverbially  ready  to  interpret 


68  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

subtlety  as  duplicity,  and  to  rebuke  reticence  and 
indirectness  as  deceit  and  hypocrisy.  Prejudice 
of  this  sort  was  probably  the  real  cause  of  Canon 
Kingsley's  famous  attack  upon  Newman.  He  had 
an  instinctive  dislike  of  Newman's  sinuousness  and 
suppleness,  and,  without  pausing  to  analyze  very 
carefully,  he  spoke  out  fiercely  against  Newman's 
whole  work  as  containing  a  special  variety  of  eccle- 
siastical hypocrisy.  The  charge  was  the  more 
plausible  inasmuch  as  there  is  unquestionably  a 
certain  debased  ecclesiastical  manner  whose 
cheaply  insinuating  suavity  might,  by  hasty  ob- 
servers, be  confused  with  Newman's  bearing  and 
style.  Yet  the  injustice  of  this  confusion  and  the 
unfairness  of  Kingsley's  charges  become  plain 
after  a  moment's  analysis. 

In  spite  of  Newman's  ease  and  affability,  a  fair- 
minded  reader  feels,  throughout  his  writings,  when 
he  stops  to  consider,  an  underlying  suggestion  of 
uncompromising  strength  and  unwavering  convic- 
tion. He  is  sure  that  the  author  is  really  revealing 
himself  frankly  and  unreservedly,  notwithstanding 
his  apparent  self-effacement,  and  that  he  is  impos- 
ing his  own  conclusions,  persuasively  and  con- 
strainingly.  Moreover,  the  reader  is  sure  that, 
however  adroitly  Newman  may  be  developing  his 
thesis,  with  an  eye  to  the  skilful  manipulation  of 
his  readers'  prejudices,  he  would  at  any  moment 
give  a  point-blank  answer  to  a  point-blank  ques- 
tion.    There  is  never  any  real  doubt  of  Newman's 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  69 

courage  and  manly  English  temper,  or  of  his  readi- 
ness to  meet  an  opponent  fairly  on  the  grounds  of 
debate.  In  the  last  analysis,  it  is  this  fundamen- 
tal sincerity  of  tone  and  this  all-pervasive,  but  un- 
obtrusive self-assertion  that  preserve  Newman's 
style  from  the  undue  flexibility  and  the  insincerity 
of  the  debased  ecclesiastical  style,  just  as  his 
unfailing  good  taste  preserves  him  from  its  cheap 
suavity  or  unctuousness. 

But  Newman's  adroitness  and  rhetorical  skill 
have  exposed  him  to  charges  of  still  another  kind, 
charges  that  concern  the  very  substance  of  his 
thought  and  intellectual  life,  and  charges  that  have 
been  urged  with  much  greater  dialectical  skill  than 
Canon  Kingsley  could  attain  to.  In  a  general 
examination  of  Newman's  theories,'  Mr.  E.  A. 
Abbott 1  has  accused  him  of  systematically  doctor- 
ing truth,  and  of  having  elaborated,  tiiough  per- 
haps unconsciously,  various  ingenious  methods  for 
inveigling  unsuspecting  readers  into  the  acceptance 
of  doubtful  propositions,  methods  for  which  Mr. 
Abbott  has  devised  satirical  names,  the  Art  of 
Lubrication,  the  Art  of  Oscillation,  the  Art  of 
Assimilation.  He  does  not  assert  that  Newman 
consciously  palters  with  truth,  or  tries  to  make 
the  worse  appear  the  better  reason.  But  he  urges 
that  Newman  was  constitutionally  fonder  of  other 
things  than  of  truth,  that  he  desired,  with  an  over- 
mastering strength,  to  establish  certain  conclusions, 

1  Philomythus,  by  E.  A.  Abbott,  London,  1891. 


70  NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER 

and  that  lie  persuaded  himself  of  their  correctness 
by  a  series  of  manoeuvres  which  really  involved 
insincere  logic. 

Here,  again,  the  charges  that  are  made  against 
Newman  seem  the  result  of  prejudice  and  tempera- 
mental hostility  on  the  part  of  his  critic.  Mr. 
Abbott  is  a  bit  of  a  formalist,  a  Caledonian  in- 
tellect) a  thorough-going  positivist,  a  thinker  for 
whom  the  only  truth  that  exists  is  truth  that  can 
be  scientifically  verified.  He  is  quite  unable  to 
comprehend,  or,  at  any  rate,  to  tolerate,  Newman's 
mental  constitution  and  his  resulting  methods  of 
conceiving  of  life  and  relating  himself  to  its  facts. 
Truth  is  to  Newman  a  much  subtler  matter,  a  much 
more  elusive  susbtance,  than  it  is  to  the  positivist, 
to  the  mere  intellectual  dealer  in  facts  and  in  fig- 
ures; it  cannot  be  packed  into  syllogisms  as  pills 
are  packed  into  a  box ;  it  cannot  be  conveyed  into 
the  human  system  with  the  simple  directness  which 
the  Laputa  wiseacre  aimed  at  who  was  for  teaching 
his  pupils  geometry  by  feeding  them  on  paper  duly 
inscribed  with  geometrical  figures.  Moreover,  lan- 
guage is  an  infinitely  treacherous  medium;  words 
are  so  "false,"  so  capable  of  endless  change,  that 
one  is  "loath  to  prove  reason  with  them."  Read- 
ers, too,  are  widely  diverse,  and  are  open  to  count- 
less other  appeals  than  that  of  sheer  logic.  Because 
of  such  considerations  as  these,  Newman  is  con- 
tinually studious  of  effect  in  his  writings;  he  is  in- 
tensely conscious  of  his  audience ;  and  he  is  always 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE- WHITER  71 

striving  to  win  a  way  for  his  convictions,  and  aim- 
ing to  insinuate  them  into  the  minds  and  hearts  of 
his  hearers  by  gently  persuasive  means. 

But  all  this  by  no  means  implies  any  real  care- 
lessness of  truth  on  Newman's  part,  or  any  sacri- 
fice of  truth  to  expediency.  Truth  is  difficult  of 
attainment,  and  hard  to  transmit;  all  the  more 
strenuously  does  Newman  set  himself  to  trace  it 
out  in  its  obscurity  and  remoteness,  and  to  reveal  it 
in  all  its  intricacies.  Moreover,  subtle  and  elusive 
as  it  may  be,  it  is  nevertheless  something  tangible 
and  describable  and  defensible;  something,  further- 
more, of  the  acquisition  of  which  Newman  can  give 
a  very  definite  account;  something  as  far  as  possible 
from  mere  misty  sentiment,  and  something,  further- 
more, to  be  strenuously  asserted  and  defended. 

Sympathetic  and  patient  readers  of  Newman, 
then,  can  hardly  doubt  his  essential  mental  integ- 
rity or  his  courage  and  readiness  to  be  frank,  even 
in  those  passages  or  in  those  works  where  the 
search  for  the  subtlest  shades  of  truth,  or  the 
desire  to  avoid  clashing  needlessly  on  prejudice, 
or  the  wish  to  win  a  favourable  hearing,  takes  the 
author  most  indirectly  and  tortuously  towards  his 
end.  It  is  his  underlying  manliness  of  mind  and 
frank  readiness  to  give  an  account  of  himself  that 
prevent  Newman's  prevailing  subtlety,  adroitness, 
and  suavity  from  leaving  on  the  mind  of  an  unprej- 
udiced reader  any  impression  of  timorousness  or 
disingenuousness. 


72  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WHITER 

II 

In  what  has  been  said  of  Newman's  realization 
of  the  elusive  nature  of  truth  and  of  the  great  diffi- 
culty of  securing  a  welcome  for  it  in  the  minds  and 
hearts  of  the  mass  of  men  lies  the  key  to  what  is 
most  distinctive  in  his  methods.  He  was  a  great 
rhetorician,  and  whatever  he  produced  shows  evi- 
dence, on  analysis,  of  having  been  constructed  with 
the  utmost  niceness  of  instinct  and  deftness  of 
hand.  He  himself  frankly  admitted  his  rhetorical 
bent.  Writing  to  Hurrell  Froude  in  1836,  about 
the  management  of  the  Tractarian  agitation,  he 
says,  "  You  and  Keble  are  the  philosophers,  and  I 
the  rhetorician."  1  And  in  a  somewhat  earlier  let- 
ter he  speaks  of  his  aptitude  for  rhetoric  in  even 
stronger  terms :  "  I  have  a  vivid  perception  of  the 
consequences  of  certain  admitted  principles,  have 
a  considerable  intellectual  capacity  of  drawing 
them  out,  have  the  refinement  to  admire  them,  and 
a  rhetorical  or  histrionic  power  to  represent  them." 2 

This  rhetorical  skill  was  partly  natural  and  in- 
stinctive, and  partly  the  result  of  training.  From 
his  earliest  years  as  a  student,  Newman  had  been 
conspicuous  for  the  subtlety  and  flexibility  of  his 
intelligence,  for  his  readiness  in  assuming  for 
speculative  purposes  the   most   diverse   points  of 

1  Letters  and  Correspondence  of  J.  H.  Newman,  1891,  II,  156. 

2  Ibid.,  I,  416. 


NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE- WHITER  73 

view,  and  for  his  insight  into  temperaments  and 
his  comprehension  of  their  modifying  action  on  the 
white  light  of  truth.     With  this  admirable  equip- 
ment for  effective  rhetorical  work,  he  came  directly 
under  the  influence,  in  Oriel  College,  of  two  excep- 
tionally  great    rhetoricians,    Dr.    Copleston,    for 
many  years  Provost  of  Oriel,  and  Whately,  one  of 
its   most   influential   Fellows.      Copleston  was   a 
famous  controversialist  and  dialectician,  who  had 
long  been  regarded  as  the  chief  champion  of  the 
University  against  the  attacks  of  outsiders.     His  ( 
Advice  to  a  Young  Reviewer  with  a  Specimen  of  the 
Art  (1807),  had  turned  into  ridicule  the  airs  and 
pretensions  of  the  young  Edinburgh  reviewers  and 
had  led  them  into   severe   strictures    on   Univer- 
sity methods,  against  which  attacks,  however,  Dr. 
Copleston  had  vigorously  defended  Oxford  in  vari-  j 
ous  publications,  to  the  satisfaction  of  all  Univer- 
sity'men.     He  was  the  Provost  of  Oriel  during  the 
first  year  of  Newman's  residence  there,  and  sug- 
gestions of  the  influence  of  his  ideas  and  methods 
are  to  be  found  throughout  the  early  pages  of  the 
Apologia  and  the  Autobiographical  Memoir.     Still 
more  decisive,   however,   was   the    influence  of  a 
yet  more  famous  rhetorician,  Dr.  Whately,  whose 
lectures  on  logic  and  on  rhetoric  remained  almost 
down  to  the  present  day  standard  text-books   in 
those  subjects.     Whately  was  also  renowned  as  a 
controversialist,  and  his  Historic  Doubts  relative  to 
Napoleon  Buonaparte  was  perhaps  the  cleverest  and 


74  NEWMAN   AS  A  PROSE-WlilTEK 

most  famous  piece  of  ironical  argumentation  pro- 
duced in  England  during  the  first  quarter  of  the 
century.  Newman,  for  several  of  his  most  impres-i 
sionable  years,  was  intimately  associated  with 
Whately.  "He  emphatically  opened  my  mind," 
Newman  says  in  the  Apologia,  "  and  taught  me  to 
think  and  to  use  my  reason."  Under  the  influence 
of  these  two  masters  of  rhetoric  and  redoubtable 
controversialists  Newman's  natural  aptitude  for 
rhetorical  methods  was  encouraged  and  fostered,  so 
that  he  became  a  perfect  adept  in  all  the  arts  of  i 
exposition  and  argumentation  aud  persuasion. 

Whatever  work  of  Newman's,  then,  we  take  up, 
we  may  be  sure  that  its  construction  will  repay 
careful  analysis.  In  trying  to  present  any  set  of 
truths,  Newman  was  consciously  confronting  a 
delicate  psychological  problem;  he  was  aware  of 
the  elements  that  entered  into  the  problem;  he 
knew  what  special  difficulties  he  had  to  face  because 
of  the  special  nature  of  the  truth  he  was  dealing 
with,  —  its  abstractness,  or  complexity,  or  novelty. 
He  had  measured,  also,  the  precise  degree  of  re- 
sistance he  must  expect  because  of  the  peculiar 
prejudices  or  preoccupations  of  his  readers.  And 
the  shape  which  his  discussion  finally  took  —  the 
particular  methods  that  he  followed  —  were  the 
result  of  a  deliberate  adaptation  of  means  to  ends ; 
they  were  the  methods  that  his  trained  rhetorical 
instinct  and  his  insight  into  the  truth  he  was 
handling  and  into  the  temperaments  and  intelli- 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  75 

gences  lie  was  to  address  himself  to  dictated  as 
most  likely  to  persuade. 

Although  ordinarily  Newman  does  not  explain 
the  method  he  follows  or  comment  on  the  difficul- 
ties of  his  problem,  he  has,  in  his  Apologia,  de- 
parted from  this  rule,  and  taken  his  readers  into 
his  confidence.  In  the  first  thirty  pages  of  this 
self -justificatory  piece  of  writing,  he  sets  forth 
minutely  the  prejudices  against  which  he  must 
make  his  way,  considers  various  possible  modes 
of  overcoming  these  prejudices,  notes  the  precise 
reasons  that  finally  lead  him  to  the  actual  plan  he 
chooses,  and  is  entirely  explicit  as  to  the  elaborate 
design  that  underlies  and  controls  the  seeming 
desultoriness  of  his  whole  discussion. 

The  problem  which  in  this  case  confronted  New- 
man was  briefly  as  follows.  He  had  been  charged 
by  Kingsley  with  teaching  "lying  on  system." 
He  had  protested  against  the  charge  and  had  ob- 
tained a  half-hearted  apology.  Later,  however,  the 
charge  had  been  reiterated  more  formally,  and  with 
the  added  taunt  that  as  Newman  recommended  sys- 
tematic dissimulation  no  one  could  be  expected  to 
accept  his  self-exculpating  word.  These  charges 
fell  in,  as  Newman  recognized,  first,  with  the  gen- 
eral trend  of  British  prejudice  against  Roman 
Catholics,  and,  secondly,  with  the  particular  prej- 
udice against  Newman  himself  that  sprang  from 
his  early  attempts  to  make  the  Anglican  Church 
more   Catholic,   and  his   subsequent   secession   to 


76  NEWMAN  AS   A  PROSE-WRITER 

Eome.  How,  then,  was  Newman  to  persuade  the 
public  of  Kingsley's  injustice  and  his  own  inno- 
cence? He  saw  at  once  that  to  deal  with  each 
separate  charge  would  be  mere  waste  of  time;  to 
prove  that  in  a  special  case  he  had  not  lied  or 
recommended  lying  would  carry  him  no  whit  to- 
wards his  end,  as  long  as  contemptuous  distrust  re- 
mained the  dominant  mood  of  the  British  mind 
towards  himself  and  his  party.  First  of  all,  he 
must  conquer  this  mood;  he  must  overthrow  the 
presumption  against  him,  and  win  for  his  cause  at 
least  such  an  unbiassed  hearing  as  is  accorded  to 
the  ordinary  man  upon  trial  whose  record  has  been 
hitherto  clean;  then  he  might  hope  to  secure  for 
his  particular  denials  a  universal  scope.  The 
method  that  he  chose  in  order  to  win  his  readers 
was  admirably  conceived.  He  would  put  himself 
vitally  and  almost  dramatically  before  them;  he 
would  bring  them  within  the  actual  sound  of  his 
voice  and  the  glance  of  his  eye;  he  would  let  them 
follow  him  through  the  long  course  of  his  years  as 
student,  tutor,  preacher,  and  leader,  and  come  to 
know  him  as  intimately  as  those  few  friends  had 
known  him  with  whom  he  had  lived  most  freely. 
Then,  he  would  ask  his  readers,  when  he  had  put 
his  personality  before  them  in  its  many  shifting, 
but  continuous  aspects,  and  with  all  the  intense 
persuasiveness  of  a  dramatic  portrayal,  whether 
they  were  ready  to  believe  of  the  man  they  had 
thus  watched  through  the  round  of  his  duties  that 


NEWMAN   AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  JJ 

he  was  a  liar.  Of  the  peculiar  power  which  New- 
man could  count  on  exerting  in  thus  appealing  to 
his  personal  charni  he  was,  of  course,  unable  to 
speak  in  his  Preface.  In  truth,  however,  he  was 
having  recourse  to  an  influence  which  had  always 
been  potent  whenever  it  had  had  a  chance  to  make 
itself  felt.  Throughout  his  life  at  Oxford  it  was 
true  of  his  relations  to  others  that  "friends  un- 
asked, unhoped"  had  "come,"  —  all  men  who  met 
him  falling  almost  inevitably  under  the  sway  of  his 
winning  and  commanding  personality.  Newman 
was,  therefore,  well  advised  when  he  resolved  to 
reveal  himself  to  the  world  and  to  trust  to  the  con- 
ciliating effect  of  this  self -revelation  to  prepare  for 
his  specific  denial  of  Kingsley's  charges. 

In  accordance  with  this  purpose  and  plan,  the 
Apologia  pro  Vita  Sua,  or  History  of  his  Religious 
Opinions,  was  written;  and  for  these  reasons  his 
answer  to  certain  definite  charges  of  equivocation 
and  systematic  and  elaborate  misrepresentation 
was  so  shaped  as  to  include  in  its  scope  the 
story  of  his  whole  life.  Of  the  384  pages  of 
the  original  edition  of  the  Apologia,  only  the 
last  93  pages  are  devoted  to  the  actual  refutation 
of  Kingsley's  charges;  the  238  pages  that  precede 
are  merely  persuasive,  and  simply  prepare  the 
way  for  the  final  defence.  Probably  in  no  other 
piece  of  writing  is  the  actual  demonstration  so 
curiously  small  in  proportion  to  the  means  that  are 
taken  to  make  the  logic  effective.     Of  course,  it 


78  NEWMAN  AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

may  be  urged  in  reply  to  this  view  of  the  construc- 
tion of  the  Apologia,  that  to  look  at  the  book  as 
purely  a  reply  to  Kingsley,  is  to  judge  it  from  an 
arbitrary  and  artificial  point  of  view,  and  hence  to 
distort  it  inevitably  and  throw  its  parts  out  of  pro- 
portion ;  that  the  real  aim  of  the  book  was  simply 
and  sincerely  autobiographic,  and  that,  regarding 
the  book  as  frank  autobiography,  the  critic  need 
find  nothing  strange  in  the  proportioning  of  its 
parts.  In  answer  to  this  objection,  it  should  be 
noted  that  the  last  pages  of  the  book  deal  directly 
and  argumentatively  with  "  Mr.  Kingsley's  accusa- 
tions " ;  that  the  transition  in  Part  VII.  from  the 
history  of  Newman's  opinions  to  the  discussion  of 
the  theory  of  truth-telling  is  almost  imperceptible ; 
and,  finally,  that  Newman  himself  has  declared  in 
the  early  pages  of  the  book  that  the  sole  reason  for 
his  self-revelations  is  his  wish  to  clear  away  mis- 
conceptions, to  win  once  again  the  confidence  of 
that  English  public  that  had  long  been  distrustful 
of  him,  and  to  make  widely  effective  his  refutation 
of  Kingsley's  charges.  The  book,  then,  is  fairly 
to  be  described  as  an  enormously  elaborate  and  in- 
genious piece  of  special  pleading  to  prepare  the 
way  for  a  few  syllogisms  that  have  now  become 
grotesquely  insignificant. 

It  has  been  worth  while  to  lay  great  stress  on 
this  disproportion  between  persuasion  and  demon- 
stration in  the  Apologia,  because  this  disproportion 
illustrates,  with  almost  the  over-emphasis  of  carica- 


NEWMAN  AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  79 

ture,  certain  of  Newman's  fundamental  beliefs  and 
resulting  tricks  of  method.  First  and  foremost,  it 
illustrates  the  slight  esteem  in  which  he  held  the 
formal  logic  of  the  schools  and  syllogistic  demon- 
strations. Not  that  he  failed  to  recognize  the 
value  of  analysis  and  logical  demonstration  as 
verifying  processes;  but  he  unhesitatingly  subor- 
dinated these  processes  to  those  by  which  truth  is 
originally  won,  and  to  those  also  by  which  truth 
is  persuasively  inculcated. 

In  a  sermon  on  Implicit  and  Explicit  Reason,  he 
distinguishes  with  great  elaborateness  between  the 
method  by  which  the  mind  makes  its  way  almost 
intuitively  to  the  possession  of  a  new  truth,  or  set 
of  truths,  and  the  subsequent  analysis  by  which 
it  takes  account  of  this  half-instinctive  original 
process  and  renders  the  moments  of  the  process 
self-conscious  and  articulate.  His  description  of 
the  intellect  delicately  and  swiftly  feeling  its  way 
towards  truth  may  well  be  quoted  entire:  "The 
mind  ranges  to  and  fro,  and  spreads  out  and  ad- 
vances forward  with  a  quickness  which  has  become 
a  proverb,  and  a  subtlety  and  versatility  which 
baffle  investigation.  It  passes  on  from  point  to 
point,  gaining  one  by  some  indication;  another  on 
a  probability;  then  availing  itself  of  an  associa- 
tion ;  then  falling  back  on  some  received  law ;  next 
seizing  on  testimony;  then  committing  itself  to 
some  popular  impression,  or  some  inward  instinct, 
or  some  obscure  memory;  and  thus  it  makes  prog- 


80  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

ress  not  unlike  a  clainberer  on  a  steep  cliff,  who, 
by  quick  eye,  prompt  hand,  and  firm  foot,  ascends, 
how,  he  knows  not  himself,  by  personal  endow- 
ments and  by  practice,  rather  than  by  rule,  leav- 
ing no  track  behind  him,  and  unable  to  teach 
another.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  step- 
ping by  which  great  geniuses  scale  the  mountain 
of  truth  is  as  unsafe  and  precarious  to  men  in 
general  as  the  ascent  of  a  skilful  mountaineer  up 
a  literal  crag.  It  is  a  way  which  they  alone  can 
take ;  and  its  justification  lies  alone  in  their  suc- 
cess. And  such  mainly  is  the  way  in  which  all 
men,  gifted  or  not  gifted,  commonly  reason  —  not 
by  rule,  but  by  an  inward  faculty.  Reasoning, 
then,  or  the  exercise  of  reason,  is  a  living,  spon- 
taneous energy  within  us,  not  an  art." * 

But  not  only  is  syllogistic  reasoning  not  the 
original  process  by  which  truth  is  attained;  it  is 
in  no  way  essential  to  the  validity  or  completeness 
of  the  process.  "  Clearness  in  argument  certainly 
is  not  indispensable  to  reasoning  well.  Accuracy 
in  stating  doctrines  or  principles  is  not  essential  to 
feeling  and  acting  upon  them.  The  exercise  of 
analysis  is  not  necessary  to  the  integrity  of  the 
process  analyzed.  The  process  of  reasoning  is 
complete  in  itself,  and  independent. " 2 

Finally,  logical  demonstration  has  relatively 
little  value  as  a  means  of  winning  a  hearing  for 

1  Oxford  University  Sermons,  ed.  1887,  p.  257. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  259. 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  81 

new  truth,  of  securing  its  entrance  into  the  popu- 
lar consciousness,  and  of  giving  it  a  place  among 
the  determining  powers  of  life.  "Logic  makes 
but  a  sorry  rhetoric  with  the  multitude ;  first  shoot 
round  corners,  and  you  may  not  despair  of  con- 
verting by  a  syllogism."  Men  must  be  inveigled 
into  the  acceptance  of  truth ;  they  cannot  be  driven 
to  accept  it  at  the  point  of  the  syllogism.  "  The 
heart  is  commonly  reached,  not  through  the  reason, 
but  through  the  imagination,  by  means  of  direct 
impressions,  by  the  testimony  of  facts  and  events, 
by  history,  by  description.  People  influence  us, 
voices  melt  us,  looks  subdue  us,  deeds  inflame  us." 

The  application  of  all  this,  —  particularly  of 
what  Newman  says  touching  the  persuasiveness  of 
a  personal  appeal,  —  to  the  whole  method  of  the 
Apologia  hardly  needs  pointing  out.  The  work 
is,  from  first  to  last,  intensely  personal  in  its  tone 
and  matter,  persuasive  because  of  its  concreteness, 
its  dramatic  vividness,  the  modulations  of  the 
speaker's  voice,  the  sincerity  and  dignity  of  his 
look  and  bearing.  Logic,  of  course,  gives  coherence 
to  the  discussions.  The  processes  of  thought  by 
which  Newman  moved  from  point  to  point  in  his 
theological  development  are  consistently  set  forth; 
but  the  convincing  quality  of  the  book  comes  from 
its  embodiment  of  a  life,  not  from  its  systematiza- 
tion  of  a  theory. 

In  accordance  with  this  general  character  of  the 
book  is  its  tone  throughout ;  its  style  is  the  perf ec- 


82'  NEWMAN  AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

tion  of  informality  and  easy  colloquialism.  Now 
and  then,  in  describing  his  ideas  on  specially  com- 
plicated questions,  Newman  makes  use  of  numbered 
propositions,  and  proceeds,  for  the  time  being,  with 
the  precaution  and  precision  of  the  dialectician. 
But,  for  the  most  part,  he  is  as  unconstrained  and 
apparently  fortuitous  in  his  presentation  of  ideas 
as  if  he  were  merely  emulating  Montaigne  in  con- 
fidential self-revelation,  and  were  guided  by  no 
controversial  purpose.  Perhaps  no  writer  has  sur- 
passed, or  even  equalled,  Newman  in  combining 
apparent  desultoriness  of  treatment  with  real  defi- 
niteness  of  purpose  and  clairvoyance  of  method. 


Ill 

Another  admirable  example  of  Newman's  least 
formal,  and  most  characteristic,  method  may  be 
found  in  his  series  of  papers  on  the  Rise  and  Prog- 
ress of  Universities.  Here,  again,  there  is  appar- 
ent desultoriness,  or,  at  most,  a  careless  following 
of  historical  sequence.  One  after  another,  with 
what  seems  like  a  haphazard  choice,  Newman  de- 
scribes a  half-dozen  of  the  most  famous  universities 
of  the  past,  explains  popularly  their  organization, 
methods,  and  aims,  entertaining  the  reader  mean- 
while with  such  superlative  pieces  of  rhetoric  as 
the  description  of  Attica  and  Athens,  and  with 
such  dramatic  episodes  as  that  of  Abelard.  Yet 
underneath  this  apparent  caprice  runs  the  control- 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  83 

ling  purpose  of  putting  the  reader  in  possession, 
through  concrete  illustrations,  of  the  complete  idea 
of  a  typically  effective  university.  Each  special 
school  that  Newman  describes  illustrates  some  es- 
sential attribute  of  the  ideal  school;  and  inciden- 
tally the  reader,  who  is  all  the  time  beguiled,  from 
chapter  to  chapter,  by  Newman's  picturesque  detail, 
takes  into  his  mind  the  various  features,  and  ulti- 
mately the  complete  image,  of  the  perfect  type. 

In  the  series  of  Discourses  on  the  Idea  of  a  Uni- 
versity, Newman's  method  is  more  formal  and  his 
tone  more  controversial.  Newman  was  this  time 
addressing  a  distinctly  scholarly  audience,  and  was 
treating  of  a  series  of  abstract  topics,  on  which  he 
was  called  to  pronounce  in  his  character  of  proba- 
ble vice-chancellor  of  the  proposed  university. 
Accordingly,  throughout  these  Discourses  he  is 
consistently  academic  in  tone  and  manner,  and  for- 
mal and  elaborate  in  method.  He  lays  out  his 
work  with  somewhat  mechanical  precision;  he 
sketches  his  plan  strictly  beforehand;  he  defines 
terms  and  refines  upon  possible  meanings,  and 
guards  at  each  step  against  misinterpretations ;  he 
pauses  often  to  come  to  an  understanding  with  his 
hearers  about  the  progress  already  made,  and  to 
consider  what  line  of  advance  severe  logical  method 
next  dictates.  In  all  these  ways,  he  is  deliber- 
ate, explicit,  and  demonstrative.  Yet  despite  this 
strenuous  regard  for  system  and  method,  not  even 
here  does  Newman  become  crabbedly  scholastic  or 


84  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

pedantically  over-formal;  the  result  of  his  strenu- 
ousness  is,  rather,  a  finely  conscientious  circum- 
spection of  demeanour  and  an  academic  dignity  of 
bearing.  There  is  something  irresistibly  impres- 
sive in  the  perfect  poise  with  which  he  moves 
through  the  intricacies  of  the  many  abstractions 
that  his  subject  involves.  He  exhibits  each  as- 
pect of  his  subject  in  just  the  right  perspective  and 
with  just  the  requisite  minuteness  of  detail;  he 
leads  us  unerringly  from  each  point  of  view  to  that 
which  most  naturally  follows ;  he  keeps  us  always 
aware  of  the  relation  of  each  aspect  to  the  total 
sum  of  truth  he  is  trying  to  help  us  to  grasp ;  and 
so,  little  by  little,  he  secures  for  us  that  perfect 
command  of  an  intellectual  region,  in  its  concrete 
facts  and  in  its  abstract  relations,  which  exposition 
aims  to  make  possible.  These  Discourses  are  as 
fine  an  example  as  exists  in  English  of  the  union 
of  strict  method  with  charm  of  style  in  the  treat- 
ment of  an  abstract  topic. 

In  the  Development  of  Christian  Doctrine  and  the 
Grammar  of  Assent  the  severity  of  Newman's 
method  is  somewhat  greater,  as  is  but  natural  in 
strictly  scientific  treatises.  Yet  even  in  these  ab- 
stract discussions  his  style  retains  an  inalienable 
charm,  due  to  the  luminousness  of  the  atmosphere, 
the  wide-ranging  command  of  illustrations,  the 
unobtrusively  tropical  phrasing,  and  the  steady 
harmonious  sweep  of  the  periods.  Few  books  on 
equally  abstract  topics  are  as  easy  reading. 


NEWMAN  AS   A  PROSE-WRITER  85 

Newman's  methods  as  a  controversialist  may 
advantageously  be  studied  in  his  Present  Position 
of  Catholics  in  England,  —  a  work  that  contains 
some  of  his  most  ingenious  and  caustic  irony.  In 
plan  and  construction,  these  discourses  illustrate 
once  more  Newman's  consummate  skill  in  adapting 
his  method  to  the  matter  in  hand.  His  purpose  in 
this  case  is  to  right  the  Eoman  Catholic  Church 
with  the  English  nation,  to  exhibit  the  Roman 
Catholics  as  he  knows  them  to  be,  a  conscientious, 
honourable,  patriotic  body  of  men,  and  to  put  an 
end  once  for  all,  if  possible,  to  the  long  tradition 
of  calumny  that  has  persecuted  them.  Such  is 
his  problem.  He  sets  about  its  solution  charac- 
teristically. He  does  not  undertake  to  demon- 
strate the  truth  of  Roman  Catholic  doctrines,  or, 
by  direct  evidence  and  argument,  to  refute  the 
wild  charges  of  hypocrisy  and  corruption  which 
Protestants  are  habitually  making  against  Roman 
Catholics.  His  methods  are  much  subtler  than 
these  and  also  much  more  comprehensive  and 
final.  He  sets  himself  to  analyze  Protestant  prej- 
udice, and  to  destroy  it  by  resolving  it  into  its 
elements.  He  takes  it  up  historically,  and  ex- 
hibits its  origin  in  an  atmosphere  of  intense  par- 
tisan conflict,  and  its  development  in  the  midst  of 
peculiarly  favourable  intellectual  and  moral  con- 
ditions ;  he  shows  that  it  is  political  in  its  origin 
and  has  been  inwrought  into  the  very  fibre  of  Eng- 
lish national  life:  "English  Protestantism  is  the 


86  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE- WRITER 

religion  of  the  throne ;  it  is  represented,  realized, 
taught,  transmitted  in  the  succession  of  monarchs 
and  an  hereditary  aristocracy.  It  is  religion 
grafted  upon  loyalty;  and  its  strength  is  not  in 
argument,  not  in  fact,  not  in  the  unanswerable 
controversialist,  not  in  an  apostolic  succession,  not 
in  sanction  of  Scripture  —  but  in  a  royal  road  to 
faith,  in  backing  up  a  King  whom  men  see,  against 
a  Pope  whom  they  do  not  see.  The  devolution  of 
its  crown  is  the  tradition  of  its  creed ;  and  to  doubt 
its  truth  is  to  be  disloyal  towards  its  Sovereign. 
Kings  are  an  Englishman's  saints  and  doctors;  he 
likes  somebody  or  something  at  which  he  can  cry, 
'huzzah,'  and  throw  up  his  hat." 

To  hate  a  "  Romanist,"  then,  is  as  natural  for  John 
Bull  as  to  hate  a  Frenchman,  and  to  libel  him  is  a 
matter  of  patriotism.  The  Englishman's  romantic 
imagination  has  for  generations  been  spinning 
myths  of  Catholic  misdoing  to  satisfy  these  deep 
instinctive  animosities.  Moreover,  many  other 
typical  English  qualities,  in  addition  to  loyalty 
and  patriotism,  have  contributed  to  foster  and  de- 
velop this  Protestant  prejudice.  Such  are  the  con- 
trolling practical  interests  of  the  middle-class 
English,  their  content  with  compromise-working 
schemes,  and  their  contempt  for  abstractions  and 
subtleties;  their  shuddering  dislike  of  innovation; 
their  well-meaning  obstinacy  in  ignorance,  and  their 
heroic  adherence  to  familiar,  though  undeniable 
error;  their  insularity;  their  hatred  of  foreigners 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PIIOSE- WRITER  87 

in  general,  and  their  frenzied  fear  of  the  Pope  in 
particular.     With  unfailing  adroitness  of  sugges- 
tion,   Newman   makes   clear   how   these    national 
traits,  and  many  others  closely  related  to  them,  t 
have  cooperated  to  originate  and  develop  Protes- 
tant hatred  of  Roman  Catholicism.     His  mastery 
of  the  details  of  social  life  and  of  motives  of  action 
is  in  this  discussion  of  English  history  and  con- 
temporary life  specially  conspicuous.     Every  phase 
of  peculiarly  English  thought  and  feeling  is  pres-  ( 
ent  to  him;  every  intricacy  of  the  curiously  sub- 
terranean British  national  temperament  is  traced/' 
out.     And  the  result  is  that  prejudice  is  explained  j 
out  of  existence.     The  intense  hostility  that  seems 
so  primitive  an  instinct  as  to  justify  itself  like  the 
belief  in  God  or  in  an  outer  world,  is  resolved  into 
the  expression  of  a  vast  mass  of  petty,  and  often 
discreditable  instincts,  and  so  loses  all  its  validity 
in  losing  its  apparent  primitiveness  and  mystery. 

Such  is  the  general  plan  and  scope  of  Newman's 
attack  on  Protestant  prejudice ;  in  carrying  out  the 
plan  and  making  his  attack  brilliantly  effective,  he 
shows  inexhaustible  ingenuity  and  unwearied  in- 
vention. He  uses  fables,  allegories,  and  elaborate 
pieces  of  irony;  he  develops  an  unending  series  of 
picturesque  illustrations  of  Protestant  prejudice, 
drawn  from  all  sources,  past  and  present;  he  sets 
curious  traps  for  this  prejudice,  catches  it  at 
unawares,  and  shows  it  up  to  his  readers  in  guises 
they  can  hardly  defend;  he  plays  skilfully  upon 


88  NEWMAN  AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

the  instincts  that  lie  at  its  root,  and  by  clever 
manipulation  makes  them  declare  themselves  in 
a  twinkling  in  favour  of  some  aspect  of  Eoman 
Catholicism.  In  short,  he  uses  all  the  rhetorical 
devices  of  which  he  is  master  to  win  a  hearing 
from  the  half-hostile,  to  beguile  the  unwilling,  to 
amuse  the  captious,  and,  finally,  to  insinuate  into 
the  minds  of  his  readers  an  all-permeating  mood  of 
contempt  for  Protestant  narrowness  and  bigotry, 
and  of  open-minded  appreciation  of  the  merits  of 
Roman  Catholics. 

IV 

For  still  another  reason  the  lectures  on  the  Pres- 
ent Position  of  Catholics  are  specially  interesting  to 
a  student  of  Newman's  methods;  they  illustrate 
exceptionally  well  his  skill  in  the  use  of  irony. 
To  the  genuine  rhetorician  there  is  something 
specially  attractive  in  the  duplicity  of  irony,  be- 
cause of  the  opportunity  it  offers  of  playing 
with  points  of  view,  of  juggling  with  phrases,  of 
showing  virtuosity  in  the  manipulation  of  both 
thoughts  and  words.  Newman  was  too  much  of  a 
rhetorician  not  to  feel  this  fascination.  Moreover, 
he  had  learned  from  his  study  of  Copleston  and 
Whately  the  possibilities  of  irony  as  a  controver- 
sial weapon.  Copleston's  Advice  to  a  Young  Re- 
viewer, and  Whately's  Historic  Doubts  relative  to 
Napoleon  Buonaparte  were  typical  specimens  of 
academic  irony,   where,   with  impressive  dignity 


NEWMAN  AS  A   PROSE-WRITER  89 

and  suavity  and  the  most  plausible  simplicity  and 
candour,  the  writers,  while  seemingly  advocating  a 
certain  policy,  or  theory,  or  set  of  conclusions, 
were  really  sneering  throughout  at  a  somewhat 
similar  policy  or  theory  —  that  of  their  opponents 
—  and  laying  it  open  to  helpless  ridicule. 

One  of  the  most  noteworthy  characteristics  of 
Newman's  irony  —  and  in  this  point  his  irony  re- 
sembled that  of  his  masters  —  was  its  positive 
argumentative  value.  Often  an  elaborate  piece  of 
irony  is  chiefly  destructive;  it  turns  cleverly  into 
ridicule  the  general  attitude  of  mind  of  the  writer's 
opponents,  but  makes  no  attempt  to  supply  a  sub- 
stitute for  the  faith  it  destroys.  Swift's  irony  is 
usually  of  this  character.  It  is  intensely  ill- 
natured,  even  savage,  and  is  so  extravagant  that  it 
sometimes  defeats  its  own  end  as  argument.  Its 
hauteur  and  bitterness  produce  a  reaction  in  the 
mind  of  the  reader,  and  force  him  to  distrust  the 
judgment  and  sanity  of  a  man  who  can  be  so  in- 
veterately  and  fiercely  insolent.  Its  indictment  is 
so  sweeping  and  its  mood  so  cynical,  that  the 
reader,  though  he  is  bullied  out  of  any  regard  for 
the  ideas  that  Swift  attacks,  is  repelled  from 
Swift  himself,  and  made  to  hate  his  notions  as 
much  as  he  despises  those  of  Swift's  opponents. 
Moreover,  full  of  duplicity  and  innuendo  as  it  is,  its 
innuendoes  are  often  merely  disguised  sneers,  and 
not  suggestions  of  genuinely  valid  reasons  why  the 
opinions  or  prejudices  which  the  writer  is  assailing 


90  NEWMAN  AS  A   PROSE-WRITER 

should  be  abandoned.  In  the  Modest  Proposal  and 
the  Argument  against  Abolishing  Christianity,  for 
example,  the  irony  reduces  to  one  long  sneer  at 
the  prejudice,  the  selfishness,  and  the  cruelty  of 
Yahoo  human  nature ;  there  is  very  little  positive 
argument  in  behalf  of  the  oppressed  Irish  on  the 
one  hand,  or  in  favour  of  Christianity  on  the  other. 

Newman's  irony,  on  the  contrary,  is  subtle,  in- 
tellectual, and  suggestive.  It  is  positive  in  its 
insinuation  of  actual  reasons  for  abandoning  preju- 
dice against  Eoman  Catholics ;  it  is  tirelessly  adroit, 
and  adjusts  itself  delicately  to  every  part  of  the 
opposing  argument;  it  is  suggestive  of  new  ideas, 
and  not  only  makes  the  reader  see  the  absurdity  of 
some  time-worn  prejudice,  but  hints  at  its  expla- 
nation and  is  ready  with  a  new  opinion  to  take 
its  place.  In  tone,  too,  it  is  very  different  from 
Swift's  irony;  it  is  not  enraged  and  blindly  sav- 
age, but  more  like  the  best  French  irony  —  self- 
possessed,  suave,  and  oblique.  Newman  addresses 
himself  with  unfailing  skill  to  the  prejudices  of 
those  whom  he  is  trying  to  move,  and  carries  his 
readers  with  him  in  a  way  that  Swift  was  too  con- 
temptuous to  aim  at.  Newman's  irony  wins  the 
wavering,  while  it  routs  the  hostile.  This  is  the 
double  task  it  proposes  to  itself. 

An  example  of  his  irony  at  its  best  may  be  found 
in  the  amusing  piece  of  declamation  against  the 
British  Constitution  and  John  Bullism  which  New- 
man puts  into  the  mouth  of  a  Bussian  count.     The 


NEWMAN  AS   A  PROSE-WRITEE  91 

passage  occurs  in  a  lecture  on  the  Present  Position 
of  Catholics,  which  was  delivered  just  before  the 
war  with  Russia,  when  English  jealousy  of  Russia 
and  contempt  for  Russian  prejudice  and  ignorance 
were  most  intense.  It  was,  of  course,  on  these 
feelings  of  jealousy  and  contempt  that  Newman 
skilfully  played  when  he  represented  the  Russian 
count  as  grotesquely  misinterpreting  the  British 
Constitution  and  BlacJcstone' s  Commentaries,  and 
as  charging  them  with  irreligion  and  blasphemy. 
His  satirical  portrayal  of  the  Russian  and  the 
clever  manipulation  by  which  he  forces  the  count 
to  exhibit  his  stores  of  ungentle  dulness  and  his 
stock  of  malignant  prejudice  delighted  every  ordi- 
nary British  reader,  and  threw  him  into  a  pleasant 
glow  of  self-satisfaction,  and  of  sympathy  with  the 
author;  now  this  was  the  very  mood,  as  Newman 
was  well  aware,  in  which,  if  ever,  the  anti-Catho- 
lic reader  might  be  led  to  question  with  himself 
whether,  after  all,  he  was  perfectly  informed  about 
Roman  Catholicism,  or  whether  he  did  not,  like 
the  Russian  count,  take  most  of  his  knowledge  at 
second-hand  and  inherit  most  of  his  prejudice. 
Throughout  this  passage  the  ingenuity  is  conspicu- 
ous with  which  Newman  makes  use  of  English 
dislike  of  Russia  and  loyalty  to  Queen  and  Consti- 
tution; the  passage  everywhere  exemplifies  the 
adroitness,  the  flexibility,  the  persuasiveness,  and 
the  far-reaching  calculation  of  Newman's  irony. 
Indeed,  this  elaborateness  and  self-consciousness, 


92  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

and  deliberateness  of  aim,  are  perhaps,  at  times, 
limitations  on  the  success  of  his  irony;  it  is  some- 
what too  cleverly  planned  and  a  trifle  over-elaborate. 
In  these  respects  it  contrasts  disadvantageously 
with  French  irony,  which,  at  its  best,  is  so  delight- 
fully by  the  way,  so  airily  unexpected,  so  accidental, 
and  yet  so  dextrously  fatal.  It  would  be  an  in- 
structive study  in  literary  method  to  compare  New- 
man's ironical  defence  of  Koman  Catholicism  in 
the  passage  already  referred  to  with  Montesquieu's 
ironical  attack  upon  the  same  system  in  the  Lettres 
Persanes. 


When  we  turn  from  Newman's  methods  to  his 
style  in  the  narrower  meaning  of  the  term,  we  still 
find  careful  elaboration  and  ingenious  calculation 
of  effect,  although  here,  again,  the  conscientious 
workmanship  becomes  evident  only  on  reflection, 
and  the  general  impression  is  that  of  easy  and  in- 
stinctive mastery.  Nevertheless,  Newman  wrought 
out  all  that  he  wrote,  with  much  patient  recasting 
and  revising.  "It  is  simply  the  fact,"  he  tells  a 
friend  in  one  of  his  letters,  "that  I  have  been 
obliged  to  take  great  pains  with  everything  I  have 
written,  and  I  often  write  chapters  over  and  over 
again,  besides  innumerable  corrections  and  inter- 
linear additions.  ...  I  think  I  have  never  writ- 
ten for  writing's  sake;  but  my  one  and  single  desire 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  93 

and  aim  has  been  to  do  what  is  so  difficult  :  viz., 
to  express  clearly  and  exactly  ray  meaning;  this 
has  been  the  motive  principle  of  all  my  corrections 
and  re  writings." 1 

It  is  perhaps  this  sincerity  of  aim  and  this  sacri- 
fice of  the  decorative  impulse  in  the  strenuous 
search  for  adequacy  of  expression  that  keep  out 
of  Newman's  writing  every  trace  of  artificiality. 
Sophisticated  as  is  his  style,  it  is  never  mannered. 
There  is  no  pretence,  no  flourish,  no  exhibition  of 
rhetorical  resources  for  their  own  sake.  The  most 
impressive  and  the  most  richly  imaginative  pas- 
sages in  his  prose  come  in  because  he  is  betrayed 
into  them  in  his  conscientious  pursuit  of  all  the 
aspects  of  the  truth  he  is  illustrating.  Moreover, 
they  are  curiously  congruous  in  tone  with  the  most 
colloquial  parts  of  his  writing.  There  is  no  sud- 
den jar  perceptible  when,  in  the  midst  of  his  ordi- 
nary discourse,  one  chances  upon  these  passages  of 
essential  beauty;  perfect  continuity  of  texture  is 
characteristic  of  his  work.  This  perfect  con- 
tinuity of  texture  illustrates  both  the  all-pervasive 
fineness  and  nobleness  of  Newman's  temper,  which 
constantly  holds  the  elements  of  moral  and  spir- 
itual beauty  in  solution,  and  which  imprints  a  cer- 
tain distinction  upon  even  the  commonplace,  and 
also  the  flexibility  and  elasticity  of  his  style, 
which  enables  him  with  such  perfect  gradation  of 
effect  to  change  imperceptibly  from  the  lofty  to 

1  Letters,  II,  476. 


94  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

the  common.  An  admirable  example  of  this  ex- 
quisite gradation  of  values  and  continuity  of  texture 
may  be  found  in  the  third  chapter  of  Newman's 
Rise  and  Progress  of  Universities,  where  he  de- 
scribes Athens  and  the  region  round  about  as  the 
ideal  site  for  a  university.  Alike  in  the  earlier 
paragraphs  that  are  merely  expository,  and  in  the 
later  ones  that  portray  the  beauty  of  Attica,  his 
style  is  simple  and  easily  colloquial ;  and  when 
from  the  splendid  imaginative  picture  that  his 
descriptive  sentences  call  up,  he  turns  again  sud- 
denly to  exposition,  the  transition  causes  no  per- 
ceptible jar.  The  same  flexibility  and  smoothness 
of  style  is  exemplified  in  a  passage  in  the  third 
of  the  discourses  on  University  Teaching,  where  he 
defines  his  conception  of  the  Science  of  Theology. 
In  this  passage,  the  change  from  a  scientific  expla- 
nation of  the  duties  of  the  theologian  to  the  almost 
impassioned  eloquence  of  the  ascription  of  good- 
ness and  might  to  the  Deity  is  effected  with  no 
shock  or  sense  of  discontinuity. 

In  its  freedom  from  artificiality  and  in  its  perfect 
sincerity,  Newman's  style  contrasts  noticeably 
with  the  style  of  a  great  rhetorician  from  whom  he 
nevertheless  took  many  hints  —  De  Quincey.  Of 
his  careful  study  of  De  Quincey's  style  there  can 
be  no  question.  In  the  passage  on  the  Deity,  to 
which  reference  has  just  been  made,  there  are  un- 
mistakable reminiscences  of  De  Quincey  in  the 
iteration  of  emphasis  on  an  important  word,  in  the 


NEWMAN  AS   A  PROSE-WRITER  95 

frequent  use  of  inversions,  in  the  rise  and  fall  of 
the  periods,  and,  indeed,  in  the  subtle  rhythmic 
effects  throughout.  The  piece  of  writing,  how- 
ever, where  the  likeness  to  De  Quincey  and  the 
imitation  of  his  manner  and  music  are  most  evident 
is  the  sermon  on  the  Fitness  of  the  Glories  of  Mary, 
—  that  piece  of  Newman's  prose,  it  should  be  noted, 
which  is  least  defensible  against  the  charge  of  arti- 
ficiality and  undue  ornateness.  A  passage  near  the 
close  of  the  sermon  best  illustrates  the  points  in 
question:  "  And  therefore  she  died  in  private.  It 
became  Him,  who  died  for  the  world,  to  die  in  the 
world's  sight;  it  became  the  Great  Sacrifice  to  be 
lifted  up  on  high,  as  a  light  that  could  not  be  hid. 
But  she,  the  Lily  of  Eden,  who  had  always  dwelt 
out  of  the  sight  of  man,  fittingly  did  she  die  in  the 
garden's  shade,  and  amid  the  sweet  flowers  in 
which  she  had  lived.  Her  departure  made  no 
noise  in  the  world.  The  Church  went  about  her 
common  duties,  preaching,  converting,  suffering. 
There  were  persecutions,  there  was  fleeing  from 
place  to  place,  there  were  martyrs,  there  were  tri- 
umphs. At  length  the  rumour  spread  abroad  that 
the  Mother  of  God  was  no  longer  upon  earth. 
Pilgrims  went  to  and  fro;  they  sought  for  her 
relics,  but  they  found  them  not;  did  she  die  at 
Ephesus?  or  did  she  die  at  Jerusalem?  reports 
varied ;  but  her  tomb  could  not  be  pointed  out,  or 
if  it  was  found,  it  was  open;  and  instead  of  her 
pure  and  fragrant  body,  there  was  a  growth  of 


96  NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER 

lilies  from  the  earth  which  she  had  touched.  So 
inquirers  went  home  marvelling,  and  waiting  for 
further  light."1 

Though  the  cadences  of  Newman's  prose  are 
rarely  as  marked  as  here,  a  subtle  musical  beauty 
runs  elusively  through  it  all.  Not  that  there  is 
any  of  the  sing-song  of  pseudo-poetic  prose.  The 
cadences  are  always  wide-ranging  and  delicately 
shifting,  with  none  of  the  halting  iteration  and 
feeble  sameness  of  half -metrical  work.  Moreover, 
the  rhythms,  subtly  pervasive  as  they  are,  and 
even  symbolic  of  the  mood  of  the  passage  as  they 
often  prove  to  be,  never  compel  direct  recognition, 
but  act  merely  as  a  mass  of  undistinguished  under- 
and  over-tones  like  those  which  give  to  a  human 
voice  depth  and  tenderness  and  suggestiveness.        -, 

Newman  understood  perfectly  the  symbolic 
value  of  rhythm  and  the  possibility  of  imposing  ' 
upon  a  series  of  simple  words,  by  delicately  sensi- 
tive adjustment,  a  power  over  the  feelings  and  the  > 
imagination  like  that  of  an  incantation.  Several 
of  the  passages  already  quoted  or  referred  to  illus- 
trate his  instinctive  adaptation  of  cadence  to  mean- 
ing and  tone ;  another  passage,  in  which  this  same 
adaptation  is  exemplified,  occurs  towards  the  close 
of  the  Apologia,  where  Newman  describes  the  ap- 
parent moral  chaos  in  human  history.  For  subtlety 
of  modulation,  however,  and  symbolic  suggestive- 
ness, perhaps  the  tender  leave-taking  with  which 

1  Discourses  to  Mixed  Congregations,  ed.  1892,  p.  373. 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  97 

the  Apologia  concludes  is  the  most  beautiful  piece 
of  prose  that  Newman  has  written :  "  I  have  closed 
this  history  of  myself  with  St.  Philip's  name  upon 
St.  Philip's  feast-day;  and  having  done  so,  to 
whom  can  I  more  suitably  offer  it,  as  a  memorial 
of  affection  and  gratitude,  than  to  St.  Philip's  sons, 
my  dearest  brothers  of  this  House,  the  Priests 
of  the  Birmingham  Oratory,  Ambrose  St.  John, 
Henry  Austin  Mills,  Henry  Bittleston,  Edward 
Caswall,  William  Paine  Neville,  and  Henry  Igna- 
tius Dudley  Eider,  who  have  been  so  faithful  to 
me;  who  have  been  so  sensitive  of  my  needs;  who 
have  been  so  indulgent  to  my  failings ;  who  have 
carried  me  through  so  many  trials;  who  have 
grudged  no  sacrifice,  if  I  have  asked  for  it;  who 
have  been  so  cheerful  under  discouragements  of 
my  causing;  who  have  done  so  many  good  works, 
and  let  me  have  the  credit  of  them;  —  with  whom 
I  have  lived  so  long,  with  whom  I  hope  to  die. 

"And  to  you  especially,  dear  Ambrose  St.  John, 
whom  God  gave  me,  when  He  took  every  one  else 
away;  who  are  the  link  between  my  old  life  and 
my  new ;  who  have  now  for  twenty-one  years  been 
so  devoted  to  me,  so  patient,  so  zealous,  so  tender; 
who  have  let  me  lean  so  hard  upon  you;  who  have 
watched  me  so  narrowly ;  who  have  never  thought 
of  yourself,  if  I  was  in  question. 

"And  in  you  I  gather  up  and  bear  in  memory 
those  familiar,  affectionate  companions  and  coun- 
sellors,  who,   in  Oxford,   Avere  given  to  me,   one 

H 


98  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

after  another,  to  be  my  daily  solace  and  relief;  and 
all  those  others,  of  great  name  and  high  example, 
who  were  my  thorough  friends,  and  showed  me 
true  attachment  in  times  long  past ;  and  also  those 
many  younger  men,  whether  I  knew  them  or  not, 
who  have  never  been  disloyal  to  me  by  word  or 
deed;  and  of  all  these,  thus  various  in  their  rela- 
tions to  me,  those  more  especially  who  have  since 
joined  the  Catholic  Church. 

"  And  I  earnestly  pray  for  this  whole  company, 
with  a  hope  against  hope,  that  all  of  us,  who  once 
were  so  united,  and  so  happy  in  our  union,  may 
even  now  be  brought  at  length,  by  the  Power  of 
the  Divine  Will,  into  One  Fold  and  under  One 
Shepherd." 


VI 

The  careful  gradation  of  values  in  Newman's 
style  and  the  far-reaching  sweep  of  his  periods 
connect  themselves  closely  with  another  of  his 
noteworthy  characteristics  —  his  breadth  of  han- 
dling. He  manipulates  with  perfect  ease  and  pre- 
cision vast  masses  of  facts,  and  makes  them  all 
contribute  with  unerring  cooperation  to  the  pro- 
duction of  a  single  effect.  However  minute  his 
detail, — and  his  liking  for  concreteness  which 
will  be  presently  illustrated  often  incites  him  to 
great  minuteness,  —  he  is  careful  not  to  confuse 
his  composition,   destroy  the  perspective,   or  lose 


NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER  99 

sight  of  total  effect.  The  largeness  of  his  manner 
and  the  certainty  of  his  handling  place  him  at 
once  among  really  great  constructive  artists. 

Against  this  assertion  it  may  be  urged  that  in 
his  fiction  it  is  just  this  breadth  of  effect  and  con- 
structive skill  that  are  most  noticeably  lacking; 
that  each  of  his  novels,  whatever  its  merits  in 
places,  is  unsuccessful  as  a  whole,  and  leaves  a 
blurred  impression.  This  must  at  once  be  granted. 
But,  after  all,  it  is  in  his  theoretical,  or  moral,  or 
historical  work  that  the  real  Newman  is  to  be 
found;  in  such  work  he  is  much  more  himself, 
much  more  thoroughly  alive  and  efficient  than  in 
his  stories,  which,  though  cleverly  turned  out, 
were,  after  all,  things  by  the  way,  were  amateurish 
in  execution,  and  never  completely  called  forth  his 
strength.  Moreover,  even  in  his  novels,  we  find 
occasionally  the  integrating  power  of  his  imagina- 
tion remarkably  illustrated.  The  description  in 
Callista  of  the  invading  and  ravaging  locusts  is  ad- 
mirably sure  in  its  treatment  of  detail  and  even 
and  impressive  in  tone;  the  episode  of  Gurta's 
madness  is  powerfully  conceived,  is  swift  and  sure 
in  its  action,  and  is  developed  with  admirable  sub- 
ordination and  colouring  of  detail  and  regard  to 
climax. 

On  the  whole,  however,  it  must  be  granted  that 
in  his  fiction  Newman's  sense  of  total  effect  and 
his  constructive  skill  are  least  conspicuous.  In 
his  abstract  discussions  they  never  fail  him.     First 


100  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

and  foremost,  they  show  themselves  in  the  plan  of 
each  work  as  a  whole.  The  treatment  is  invariably 
symmetrical  and  exhaustive ;  part  answers  to  part 
with  the  precision  and  the  delicacy  of  adjustment 
of  a  work  of  art.  Each  part  is  conscious  of  the 
whole  and  has  a  vitally  loyal  relation  to  it,  so  that 
the  needs  and  purposes  of  the  whole  organism  seem 
present  as  controlling  and  centralizing  instincts  in 
every  chapter,  paragraph,  and  sentence. 

In  his  use  of  elaborate  illustrations  for  the  sake 
of  securing  concreteness  and  sensuous  beauty, 
Newman  shows  this-  same  integrating  power  of 
imagination.  In  the  long  illustrations,  which 
often  take  almost  the  proportions  of  episodes  in 
the  epical  progress  of  his  argument  or  exposition, 
the  reader  has  no  sense  of  bewilderment  or  uncer- 
tainty of  aim;  the  strength  of  Newman's  mind  and 
purpose  subdues  his  endlessly  diverse  material, 
and  compels  it  into  artistic  coherence  and  vital 
unity ;  all  details  are  coloured  in  harmony  with  the 
dominant  tone  of  the  piece,  and  reenforce  a  pre- 
determined mood.  When  a  reader  commits  him- 
self to  one  of  Newman's  discussions,  he  must 
resign  himself  to  him  body  and  soul,  and  be  pre- 
pared to  live  and  move  and  have  his  being  in  the 
medium  of  Newman's  thought,  and,  moreover,  in 
the  special  range  of  thought,  and  the  special  mood, 
that  this  particular  discussion  provokes.  Perhaps 
this  omnipresence  of  Newman  in  the  minutest  de- 
tails of  each  discussion  becomes  ultimately  to  the 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PEOSE- WRITER  101 

careful  student  of  his  writing  the  most  convincing 
proof  of  the  largeness  of  his  mind,  of  the  intensity 
of  his  conception,  and  of  the  vigour  and  vitality  of 
his  imagination. 

It  may  be  urged  that  the  copiousness  of  Newman 
at  times  becomes  wearisome;  that  he  is  over-liberal 
of  both  explanation  and  illustration;  and  that  his 
style,  though  never  exuberant  in  ornament,  is  some- 
times anuoyingly  luminous,  and  blinds  with  excess 
of  light.  This  is  probably  the  point  in  which 
Newman's  style  is  most  open  to  attack.  It  is  a 
cloyingly  explicit,  rather  than  a  stimulatingly 
suggestive,  style;  it  does  almost  too  much  for  the 
reader,  and  is  almost  inconsiderately  generous. 
Yet  these  qualities  of  his  style  are  so  intimately 
connected  with  its  peculiar  personal  charm  that 
they  can  hardly  be  censured.  And  it  may  be 
noted  that  so  strenuous  an  advocate  of  the  austere 
style  as  Walter  Pater  has  instanced  Newman's 
Idea  of  a  University  as  an  example  of  "  the  perfect 
handling  of  a  theory." 

One  characteristic  of  the  purely  suggestive  style 
is  certainly  to  be  found  in  Newman's  writing,  — 
great  beauty  and  vigour  of  phrase.  This  fact  is 
the  more  noteworthy  because  a  writer  who,  like 
Newman,  is  impressive  in  the  mass,  and  excels  in 
securing  breadth  of  effect,  very  often  lacks  the 
ability  to  strike  out  memorable  epigrams.  A  few 
quotations,  brought  together  at  random,  will  show 
what  point  and  terseness  Newman  could  command 


102  NEWMAN  AS   A  PROSE-WRITER 

when  he  chose.  "  Ten  thousand  difficulties  do  not 
make  a  doubt."  "Great  things  are  done  by  devo- 
tion to  one  idea."  "Calculation  never  made  a 
hero."  "All  aberrations  are  founded  on,  and  have 
their  life  in,  some  truth  or  other."  "Great  acts 
take  time."  "A  book  after  all  cannot  make  a 
stand  against  the  wild  living  intellect  of  man." 
"To  be  converted  in  partnership."  "It  is  not  at 
all  easy  (humanly  speaking)  to  wind  up  an  Eng- 
lishman to  a  dogmatic  level."  "Paper  logic." 
"One  is  not  at  all  pleased  when  poetry,  or  elo- 
quence, or  devotion  is  considered  as  if  chiefly  in- 
tended to  feed  syllogisms."  "Here  below  to  live 
is  to  change,  and  to  be  perfect  is  to  have  changed 
often."  In  terseness  and  sententiousness  these 
utterances  could  hardly  be  surpassed  by  the  most 
acrimonious  searcher  after  epigram,  though  of 
course  they  have  not  the  glitter  of  paradox  to 
which  modern  coiners  of  phrases  aspire. 

Of  wit  there  is  very  little  to  be  found  in  New- 
man's writings ;  it  is  not  the  natural  expression  of 
his  temperament.  Wit  is  too  dryly  intellectual, 
too  external  and  formal,  too  little  vital,  to  suit 
Newman's  mental  habit.  To  the  appeal  of  humour 
he  was  distinctly  more  open.  It  is  from  the 
humorous  incongruities  of  imaginary  situations 
that  his  irony  secures  its  most  persuasive  effects. 
Moreover,  whenever  he  is  not  necessarily  preoccu- 
pied with  the  tragically  serious  aspects  of  life  and 
of  history,   or  forced  by  his  subject-matter,   and 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PKOSE-WIUTER  103 

audience,  into  a  formally  restrained  manner  and 
method,  he  has,  in  treating  any  topic,  that  urbanity 
and  half-playful  kindliness  that  come  from  a  large- 
minded  and  almost  tolerant  recognition  of  the 
essential  imperfections  of  life  and  human  nature. 
The  mood  of  the  man  of  the  world,  sweetened  and 
ennobled,  and  enriched  by  profound  knowledge 
and  deep  feeling  and  spiritual  seriousness,  gives  to 
much  of  Newman's  work  its  most  distinctive  note. 
When  he  is  able  to  be  thoroughly  colloquial,  this 
mood  and  this  tone  can  assert  themselves  most 
freely,  and  the  result  is  a  style  through  which  a 
gracious  kindliness,  which  is  never  quite  humour, 
and  which  yet  possesses  all  its  elements,  diffuses 
itself  pervasively  and  persuasively.  Throughout 
the  Rise  and  Progress  of  Universities  this  tone  is 
traceable,  and,  to  take  a  specific  example,  it  is 
largely*  to  its  influence  that  the  description  of 
Athens,  in  the  third  chapter,  owes  its  peculiar 
charm.  What  can  be  more  deliciously  incongruous 
than  the  agent  of  a  London  "  mercantile  firm  "  and 
the  Acropolis?  or  more  curiously  ill-mated  than 
his  standards  of  valuation  and  the  qualities  of  the 
Grecian  landscape?  Yet  how  little  malicious  is 
Newman's  use  of  this  incongruity  or  dispropor- 
tion, and  how  unsuspiciously  the  "agent  of  a  Lon- 
don Company  "  ministers  to  the  quiet  amusement 
of  the  reader,  and  also  helps  to  heighten,  by  con- 
trast, the  effect  of  beauty  and  romance  and  mystery 
that  Newman  is  aiming  at. 


104  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

Several  allusions  liave  already  been  made  to 
Newman's  liking  for  concreteness,  and  in  an 
earlier  paragraph  his  distrust  of  the  abstract  was 
described  and  illustrated  at  length.  These  predi- 
lections of  his  have  left  their  unmistakable  mark 
on  his  style  in  ways  more  technical  than  those  that 
have  thus  far  been  noted.  His  vocabulary  is,  for 
a  scholar,  exceptionally  idiomatic  and  unliterary; 
the  most  ordinary  and  unparsable  turns  of  every- 
day speech  are  inwrought  into  the  texture  of  his 
style.  In  the  Apologia  he  speaks  of  himself  in 
one  place  as  having  had  "  a  lounging,  free-and-easy 
way  of  carrying  things  on,"  and  the  phrase  both 
defines  and  illustrates  one  characteristic  of  his 
style.  Idioms  that  have  the  crude  force  of  popular 
speech,  the  vitality  without  the  vulgarity  of  slang, 
abound  in  his  writings.  Of  his  increasingly  clear 
recognition,  in  1839,  of  the  weakness  of  the  Angli- 
can position,  he  says :  "  The  Via  Media  was  an  im- 
possible idea;  it  was  what  I  had  called  'standing 
on  one  leg.'"  In  describing  his  loss  of  control 
over  his  party  in  1840  he  declares :  "  I  never  had 
a  strong  wrist,  but  at  the  very  time  when  it  was 
most  needed,  the  reins  had  broken  in  my  hands." 
Of  the  ineradicableness  of  evil  in  human  nature,  he 
exclaims:  "You  do  but  play  a  sort  of  'hunt  the 
slipper, '  with  the  fault  of  our  nature,  till  you  go  to 
Christianity."  Illustrations  of  this  idiomatic  and 
homely  phrasing  might  be  endlessly  multiplied. 
Moreover,  to  the  concreteness  of  colloquial  phras- 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  105 

ing,  Newman  adds  the  concreteness  of  the  specific 
word.  Other  things  being  equal,  he  prefers  the 
name  of  the  species  to  that  of  the  genus,  and  the 
name  of  the  class  to  that  of  the  species;  he  is 
always  urged  forward  towards  the  individual  and 
the  actual;  his  mind  does  not  lag  in  the  region  of 
abstractions  and  formulas,  but  presses  past  the 
general  term,  or  abstraction,  or  law,  to  the  image 
or  the  example,  and  into  the  tangible,  glowing, 
sensible  world  of  fact.  His  imagery,  though  never 
obtrusive,  is  almost  lavishly  present,  and  though 
never  purely  decorative,  is  often  very  beautiful. 
It  is  so  inevitable,  however,  springs  so  organically 
from  the  thought  and  the  mood  of  the  moment, 
that  the  reader  accepts  it  unmindfully,  and  is  con- 
scious only  of  grasping,  easily  and  securely,  the 
writer's  meaning.  He  must  first  look  back  through 
the  sentences  and  study  the  style  in  detail  before 
he  will  come  to  realize  its  continual,  but  decisive, 
divergence  from  the  literal  and  commonplace,  and 
its  essential  freshness  and  distinction. 

On  occasion,  of  course,  Newman  uses  elaborate 
figures;  but  commonly  for  purposes  of  exposition 
or  persuasion.  In  such  cases  the  reader  may  well 
note  the  thoroughness  with  which  the  figure  adjusts 
itself  to  every  turn  and  phase  of  the  thought,  and 
the  surprising  omnipresence  and  suggestiveness  of 
the  tropical  phrasing.  These  qualities  of  New- 
man's style  are  illustrated  in  the  following  passage 
from  the  Development  of  Christian  Doctrine :  — 


106  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

"  Whatever  be  the  risk  of  corruption  from  inter- 
course with  the  world  around,  such  a  risk  must  be 
encountered  if  a  great  idea  is  duly  to  be  under- 
stood, and  much  more  if  it  is  to  be  fully  exhibited. 
It  is  elicited  and  expanded  by  trial,  and  battles 
into  perfection  and  supremacy.  Nor  does  it  escape 
the  collision  of  opinion  even  in  its  earlier  years, 
nor  does  it  remain  truer  to  itself,  and  with  a  better 
claim  to  be  considered  one  and  the  same,  though 
externally  protected  from  vicissitude  and  change. 
It  is  indeed  sometimes  said  that  the  stream  is 
clearest  near  the  spring.  Whatever  use  may  fairly 
be  made  of  this  image,  it  does  not  apply  to  the 
history  of  a  philosophy  or  belief,  which,  on  the 
contrary,  is  more  equable,  and  purer,  and  stronger, 
when  its  bed  has  become  deep,  and  broad,  and  full. 
It  necessarily  rises  out  of  an  existing  state  of 
things,  and  for  a  time  savours  of  the  soil.  Its 
vital  element  needs  disengaging  from  what  is  for- 
eign and  temporary,  and  is  employed  in  efforts 
after  freedom  which  become  more  vigorous  and 
hopeful  as  its  years  increase.  Its  beginnings  are 
no  measure  of  its  capabilities,  nor  of  its  scope. 
At  first  no  one  knows  what  it  is,  or  what  it  is 
worth.  It  remains  perhaps  for  a  time  quiescent ; 
it  tries,  as  it  were,  its  limbs,  and  proves  the 
ground  under  it,  and  feels  its  way.  From  time 
to  time,  it  makes  essays  which  fail,  and  are  in  con- 
sequence abandoned.  It  seems  in  suspense  which 
way  to  go;  it  wavers,  and  at  length  strikes  out  in 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  107 

one  definite  direction.  In  time  it  enters  upon 
strange  territory;  points  of  controversy  alter  their 
bearing;  parties  rise  and  fall  around  it;  dangers 
and  hopes  appear  in  new  relations ;  and  old  princi- 
ples reappear  under  new  forms.  It  changes  with 
them  in  order  to  remain  the  same.  In  a  higher 
world  it  is  otherwise,  but  here  below  to  live  is  to 
change,  and  to  be  perfect  is  to  have  changed 
often."  *  The  image  of  the  river  pervades  this  pas- 
sage throughout,  and  yet  is  never  obtrusive  and 
never  determines  or  even  constrains  the  progress  of 
the  thought.  The  imagery  simply  seems  to  insinu- 
ate the  ideas  into  the  reader's  mind  with  a  certain 
novelty  of  appeal  and  half-sensuous  persuasiveness. 
Another  passage  of  much  this  kind  has  already 
been  quoted,  where  Newman  describes  the  advent- 
urous investigator  scaling  the  crags  of  truth.2 

Closely  akin  to  this  use  of  figures  is  Newman's 
generous  use  of  examples  and  illustrations.  What- 
ever be  the  principle  he  is  discussing,  he  is  not 
content  till  he  has  realized  it  for  the  reader  in 
tangible,  visible  form,  until  he  has  given  it  the 
cogency  and  intensity  of  appeal  that  only  sensa- 
tions or  images  possess.  In  all  these  ways,  then, 
by  his  idiomatic  and  colloquial  phrasing,  by  his 
specific  vocabulary,  by  his  delicately  adroit  use  of 
metaphors,  by  his  carefully  elaborated  imagery, 
and  by  his  wealth  of  examples  and  illustrations, 

1  Development  of  Christian  Doctrine,  ed.  1891,  pp.  39-40. 

2  See  above,  p.  79. 


108  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

Newman  keeps  resolutely  close  to  the  concrete,  and 
imparts  everywhere  to  his  style  warmth,  vividness, 
colour,  convincing  actuality. 

VII 

It  remains  to  suggest  briefly  Newman's  relation 
to  what  was  most  characteristic  in  the  thought  and 
feeling  of  his  times.  Without  any  attempt  at  a 
technical  analysis  of  his  doctrine  or  at  a  special 
study  of  his  theorizing  in  religion  and  philosophy, 
it  will  be  possible  to  connect  him,  by  virtue  of  cer- 
tain temperamental  characteristics,  and  certain 
prevailing  modes  of  conceiving  life,  with  what  was 
most  distinctive  in  the  literature  of  the  early  part 
of  the  century.  Interpreted  most  searchingly,  his 
early  Anglicanism  and  his  later  Catholicism  were 
peculiar  expressions  of  that  Romantic  spirit  which 
realized  itself  with  such  splendour  and  power  in 
the  best  and  most  vital  literature  of  his  day  and 
generation. 

Perhaps  the  most  general  formula  for  the  work 
of  English  literature  during  the  first  quarter  of  the 
present  century  is  the  rediscovery  and  vindication 
of  the  concrete.  The  special  task  of  the  eighteenth 
century  had  been  to  order,  and  to  systematize,  and 
to  name;  its  favourite  methods  had  been  analysis 
and  generalization.  It  asked  for  no  new  experi- 
ence; it  sought  only  to  master  and  reduce  to  for- 
mulas,   and  to   find    convenient   labels   for   what 


NEWMAN  AS  A   PROSE-WRITER  109 

experience  it  already  possessed.  It  was  perpetu- 
ally in  search  of  standards  and  canons ;  it  was  con- 
ventional through  and  through;  and  its  men  felt 
secure  from  the  ills  of  time  only  when  sheltered 
under  some  ingenious  artificial  construction  of  rule 
and  precedent.  Whatever  lay  beyond  the  scope  of 
their  analysis  and  defied  their  laws,  they  disliked 
and  dreaded.  The  outlying  regions  of  mystery 
which  hem  life  in  on  every  side,  are  inaccessible 
to  the  intellect  and  irreducible  in  terms  of  its 
laws,  were  strangely  repellent  to  them,  and  from 
such  shadowy  vistas  they  resolutely  turned  their 
eyes  and  fastened  them  on  the  solid  ground  at 
their  feet.  The  familiar  bustle  of  the  town,  the 
thronging  streets  of  the  city,  the  gay  life  of  the 
drawing-room,  and  coffee-house,  and  play-house; 
or  the  more  exalted  life  of  Parliament  and  Court, 
the  intrigues  of  State-chambers,  the  manoeuvres  of 
the  battle-field;  the  aspects  of  human  activity, 
wherever  collective  man  in  his  social  capacity 
goes  through  the  orderly  and  comprehensible 
changes  of  his  ceaseless  pursuit  of  worldly  happi- 
ness and  worldly  success ;  these  were  the  subjects 
that  for  the  men  of  the  eighteenth  century  had 
absorbing  charm :  in  seeking  to  master  this  intri- 
cate play  of  forces,  to  fathom  the  motives  below 
it,  to  tabulate  its  experiences,  to  set  up  standards 
to  guide  the  individual  successfully  through  the 
intricacies  of  this  commonplace,  every-day  world, 
they  spent  their  utmost  energy,  and  to  these  tasks 


110  NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER 

they  instinctively  limited  themselves.  In  poetry, 
it  was  a  generalized  view  of  life  that  they  aimed 
at,  a  semi-philosophical  representation  of  man's 
nature  and  actions.  Pope,  the  typical  poet  of  the 
century,  "stooped  to  truth  and  moralized  his 
song."  Dr.  Johnson,  the  most  authoritative  critic 
of  the  century,  taught  that  the  poet  should  "re- 
mark general  properties  and  large  appearances 
.  .  .  and  must  neglect  the  minuter  discrimina- 
tions, which  one  may  have  remarked,  and  another 
have  neglected,  or  those  characteristics  which  are 
alike  obvious  to  vigilance  and  carelessness."  In 
prose,  the  same  moralizing  and  generalizing  ten- 
dencies prevailed,  and  found  their  most  adequate 
and  thorough-going  expression  in  the  abstract  and 
pretentiously  latinized  style  of  Dr.  Johnson. 

Everywhere  thought  gave  the  law;  the  senses 
and  the  imagination  were  kept  jealously  in  subor- 
dination. The  abstract,  the  typical,  the  general 
—  these  were  everywhere  exalted  at  the  expense 
of  the  image,  the  specific  experience,  the  vital 
fact.  In  religion,  the  same  tendencies  showed 
themselves.  Orthodoxy  and  Deism  alike  were 
mechanical  in  their  conception  of  Nature  and  of 
God.  Both  Free-thinkers  and  Apologists  tried  to 
systematize  religious  experience,  and  to  rationalize 
theology.  In  the  pursuit  of  historical  evidences 
and  of  logical  demonstrations  of  the  truth  or  falsity 
of  religion,  genuine  religious  emotion  was  almost 
neglected,  or  was  actually  condemned.     Entlmsi- 


NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER  HI 

asm  was  distrusted  or  abhorred;  an  enthusiast  was  a 
madman.  Intense  feeling  of  all  kinds  was  regarded 
askance,  and  avoided  as  irrational,  unsettling,  prone 
to  disarrange  systems,  and  to  overturn  standards, 
and  burst  the  bonds  of  formulas. 

It  was  to  this  limited  manner  of  living  life  and 
of  conceiving  of  life  that  the  great  movement 
which,  for  lack  of  a  better  name,  may  be  called 
the  Romantic  Movement,  was  to  put  an  end.  The 
Romanticists  sought  to  enrich  life  with  new  emo- 
tions, to  conquer  new  fields  of  experience,  to  come 
into  imaginative  touch  with  far  distant  times,  to 
give  its  due  to  the  encompassing  world  of  dark- 
ness and  mystery,  and  even  to  pierce  through  the 
darkness  in  the  hope  of  finding,  at  the  heart  of 
the  mystery,  a  transcendental  world  of  infinite 
beauty  and  eternal  truth.  A  keener  sense  of  the 
value  of  life  penetrated  them  and  stirred  them  into 
imaginative  sympathy  with  much  that  had  left  the 
men  of  the  eighteenth  century  unmoved.  They 
found  in  the  naive  life  of  Nature  and  animals  and 
children  picturesqueness  and  grace  that  were  want- 
ing in  the  sophisticated  life  of  the  "  town  " ;  they 
delighted  in  the  mysterious  chiaroscuro  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  in  its  rich  blazonry  of  passion,  and 
its  ever-changing  spectacular  magnificence;  they 
looked  forward  with  ardour  into  the  future,  and 
dreamed  dreams  of  the  progress  of  man;  they 
opened  their  hearts  to  the  influences  of  the  spir- 
itual world,   and  religion  became  to  them  some- 


112  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

tiling  more  than  respectability  and  morality.  In 
every  way  they  endeavoured  to  give  some  new 
zest  to  life,  to  impart  to  it  some  line  novel  flavour, 
to  attain  to  some  exquisite  new  experience.  They 
sought  this  new  experience  imaginatively  in  the 
past,  with  Scott  and  Southey;  they  sought  it  with 
fierce  insistence  in  foreign  lands,  following  Byron, 
and  in  the  wild  exploitation  of  individual  fancy 
and  caprice;  they  sought  it  with  Coleridge  and 
Wordsworth  through  the  revived  sensitiveness  of 
the  spirit  and  its  intuitions  of  a  transcendental 
world  of  absolute  reality;  they  sought  it  with 
Shelley  in  the  regions  of  the  vast  inane. 
^  Now  it  was  in  the  midst  of  these  restless  con- 
,  ditions  and  under  the  influence  of  all  this  new 
i  striving  and  aspiration  that  Newman's  youth  and 
i  most  impressionable  years  of  development  were 
spent,  and  he  took  colour  and  tone  from  his  epoch 
to  a  degree  that  has  often  been  overlooked.  His 
work,  despite  its  reactionary  character,  indeed, 
partly  because  of  it,  is  a  genuine  expression  of 
the  Romantic  spirit,  and  can  be  understood  only 
when  thus  interpreted  and  brought  into  relation 
with  the  great  tendencies  of  thought  and  feeling  of 
the  early  part  of  our  century.  Of  his  direct  in- 
debtedness to  Scott,  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge, 
he  has  himself  made  record  in  the  Apologia  and 
in  his  Autobiographical  Sketch.2    But  far  more  im- 

1  Apologia,  ed.  1890,  p.  96. 

2  Letters  and  Correspondence,  I,  18. 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  113 

portant  than  the  influence  of  any  single  man  was 
the  penetrating  and  determining  action  upon  him 
of  the  Romantic  atmosphere,  overcharged  as  it 
was  with  intense  feeling  and  tingling  with  new 
thought.  The  results  of  this  action  may  be  traced 
throughout  his  temperament  and  in  all  his  work. 

Medievalism,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a  distinctive 
note  of  the  Eomantic  spirit,  and,  certainly,  New- 
man was  intensely  alive  to  the  beauty  and  the 
poetic  charm  of  the  life  of  the  Middle  Ages.  One 
is  sometimes  tempted  to  describe  him  as  a  great 
mediaeval  ecclesiastic  astray  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury and  heroically  striving  to  remodel  modern  life 
in  harmony  with  his  temperamental  needs.  His 
imagination  was  possessed  with  the  Eomantic  vision 
of  the  greatness  of  the  mediaeval  Church,  —  of  its 
splendour  and  pomp  and  dignity,  and  of  its  power 
over  the  hearts  and  lives  of  its  members ;  and  the 
Oxford  movement  was  in  its  essence  an  attempt  to 
reconstruct  the  English  Church  in  harmony  with 
this  Eomantic  ideal,  to  rouse  the  Church  to  a  vital 
realization  of  its  own  great  traditions,  and  to  re- 
store to  it  the  prestige  and  the  dominating  position 
it  had  had  in  the  past.  As  Scott's  imagination 
was  fascinated  with  the  picturesque  paraphernalia 
of  feudalism,  —  with  its  jousts,  and  courts  of  love, 
and  its  coats  of  mail  and  buff -jerkins,  —  so  New- 
man's imagination  was  captivated  by  the  gorgeous 
ritual  and  ceremonial,  the  art  and  architecture  of 
mediaeval  Christianity,  and  found  in  them  the  sym- 


114  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

bols  of  the  spirit  of  mystery  and  awe  which  was 
for  him  the  essentially  religious  spirit,  and  of  the 
mystical  truths  of  which  revealed  religion  was 
made  up.  The  Church,  as  Newman  found  it,  was 
Erastian  and  worldly;  it  was  apt  to  regard  itself 
as  merely  an  ally  of  the  State  for  the  maintenance 
of  order  and  spread  of  morality;  it  was  coldly 
rational  in  belief  and  theology,  and  prosaic  in  its 
conception  of  religious  truth  and  of  its  own  posi- 
tion and  functions.  Newman  sought  to  revive  in 
the  Church  a  mediaeval  faith  in  its  own  divine  mis- 
sion and  the  intense  spiritual  consciousness  of  the 
Middle  Ages;  he  aimed  to  restore  to  religion  its 
mystical  character,  to  exalt  the  sacramental  sys- 
tem as  the  divinely  appointed  means  for  the  sal- 
vation of  souls,  and  to  impose  once  more  on  men's 
imaginations  the  mighty  spell  of  a  hierarchical 
organization,  the  direct  representative  of  God  in 
the  world's  affairs.  Such  was  the  mediaeval  ideal 
to  which  he  devoted  himself.  Both  he  and  Scott 
substantially  ruined  themselves  through  their 
mediaevalism.  Scott's  luckless  attempt  was  to 
place  his  private  and  family  life  upon  a  feudal 
basis  and  to  give  it  mediaeval  colour  and  beauty; 
Newman  undertook  a  much  nobler  and  more  heroic, 
but  more  intrinsically  hopeless  task,  — that  of  re- 
creating the  whole  English  Church  in  harmony 
with  mediaeval  conceptions. 

Before  Newman,  Keble  had  already  conceived  of 
the  English  Church  in  this  imaginative  spirit.     In 


NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER  115 

one  of  his  Essays,  Newman  describes  how  Keble 
had  made  the  Church  "poetical,"  had  "kindled 
hearts  towards  it, "  and  by  "  his  happy  magic  "  had 
thrown  upon  its  ritual,  offices,  and  servants  a 
glamour  and  beauty  of  which  they  had  for  many 
generations  been  devoid.  It  was  to  the  continu- 
ance and  the  furtherance  of  this  process  of  regen- 
eration and  transfiguration  that  Newman  devoted 
the  Tractarian  movement. 

But  the  essentially  Romantic  character  of  the 
new  movement  comes  out  in  other  ways  than  in 
its  idealization  of  the  Church.  The  relation  of 
Newman  and  of  his  friends  to  Nature  was  closely 
akin  to  that  of  the  Romanticists.  Newman,  like 
Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  and  Shelley,  found  Nature 
mysteriously  beautiful  and  instinct  with  strange 
significance,  a  divinely  elaborated  language  where- 
by God  speaks  through  symbols  to  the  human  soul. 
Keble's  Christian  Year  is  full  of  this  interpreta- 
tion of  natural  sights  and  sounds  as  images  of 
spiritual  truth,  and  with  this  mystical  conception 
of  Nature  Newman  was  in  sympathy.  Nature  was 
for  him  as  rich  in  its  spiritual  suggestiveness,  as 
for  Wordsworth  or  Shelley,  and  was  as  truly  for 
him  as  for  Carlyle  or  Goethe  the  visible  garment 
of  God.  But  in  interpreting  the  emotional  value 
of  Nature  Newman  had  recourse  to  a  symbolism 
drawn  ready-made  from  Christianity.  The  mys- 
tical beauty  of  Nature,  instead  of  calling  up  in  his 
imagination  a  Platonic  ideal  world,  as  with  Shelley, 


116  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

or  adumbrating  the  world  of  eternal  verity  of  Ger- 
man transcendentalism,  as  with  Wordsworth  and 
Coleridge,  suggested  the  presence  and  power  of 
seraphs  and  angels.  Of  the  angels  he  says,  "Every 
breath  of  air  and  ray  of  light  and  heat,  every  beau- 
tiful prospect,  is,  as  it  were,  the  skirts  of  their 
garments,  the  waving  of  the  robes  of  those  whose 
faces  see  God."  Again,  he  asks,  "What  would  be 
the  thoughts  of  a  man  who,  when  examining  a 
flower,  or  an  herb,  or  a  pebble,  or  a  ray  of  light, 
which  he  treats  as  something  so  beneath  him  in  the 
scale  of  existence,  suddenly  discovered  that  he  was 
in  the  presence  of  some  powerful  being  who  was 
hidden  behind  the  visible  things  he  was  inspecting, 
—  who,  though  concealing  his  wise  hand,  was  giv- 
ing them  their  beauty,  grace,  and  perfection,  as 
being  God's  instrument  for  the  purpose,  —  nay, 
whose  robe  and  ornaments  those  objects  were, 
which  he  was  so  eager  to  analyze?  "  * 

Despite  the  somewhat  conventional  symbolism 
that  pervades  these  passages,  the  mystical  mood 
in  the  contemplation  of  Nature  that  underlies  and 
suggests  them  is  substantially  the  same  that  ex- 
presses itself  through  other  imagery  in  the  Ro- 
mantic poets.  In  his  intense  sensitiveness,  then, 
to  the  emotional  value  of  the  visible  universe, 
and  in  his  interpretation  of  the  beauty  of  hill 
and  valley  and  mountain  and  stream  in  terms 
of    subjective   emotion,    Newman    may   justly   be 

1  Apologia,  p.  28. 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PKOSE-WRITER  117 

said  to  have  shared  in  the  Komantic  Return  to 
Nature. 

But  in  a  still  more  important  way,  Newman's 
work  was  expressive  of  the  Return  to  Nature. 
Under  this  term  is  to  be  included  not  merely  the 
fresh  delight  that  the  Romanticists  felt  in  the 
splendour  of  the  firmament  and  the  tender  beauty 
or  the  sublimity  of  sea  and  land,  but  also  their 
eager  recognition  of  the  value  of  the  instinctive, 
the  spontaneous,  the  natural  in  life,  as  opposed  to 
the  artificial,  the  self -conscious,  the  systematic, 
and  the  conventional.  This  recognition  pervades 
all  the  literature  of  the  first  quarter  of  our  cen- 
tury, and,  in  fact,  in  one  form  or  another,  is  the 
characteristic  note  of  what  is  most  novel  in  the 
thought  and  the  life  of  the  time.  In  this  Return 
to  Nature  Newman  shared.  For  him,  as  for  all 
the  Romanticists,  life  itself  is  more  than  what  we 
think  about  life,  experience  is  infinitely  more  sig- 
nificant than  our  formulas  for  summing  it  up,  and 
transcends  them  incalculably.  General  terms  are 
but  the  makeshifts  of  logic  and  can  never  cope  with 
the  multiplicity  and  the  intensity  of  sensation  and 
feeling.  Newman's  elaborate  justification  of  this 
indictment  of  logic  is  wrought  out  in  the  Grammar 
of  Assent  and  in  his  Sermon  on  Implicit  and  Ex- 
plicit Reason. 

Throughout  these  discourses  he  pleads  for  those 
vital  processes  of  thought  and  feeling  and  intui- 
tion which  every  man  goes  through  for  himself  in 


118  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

his  acquisition  of  concrete  truth,  and  which  he 
can  perhaps  describe  in  but  a  stammering  and  in- 
consequent fashion  in  the  terms  of  the  schoolman's 
logic.  It  is  by  these  direct,  spontaneous  processes, 
Newman  urges,  that  men  reach  truth  in  whatever 
concrete  matter  they  apply  themselves  to,  and  the 
truth  that  they  reach  need  be  none  the  less  true 
because  they  have  not  the  knack  of  setting  forth 
syllogistically  their  reasons  for  accepting  it.  In 
his  rejection,  then,  of  formal  demonstration  as  the 
sole  method  for  attaining  truth,  in  his  recognition 
of  the  limitations  of  logic,  and  in  his  deep  convic- 
tion of  the  surpassing  importance  of  the  spontane- 
ous and  instinctive  in  life  Newman  was  at  one  with 
the  Komanticists,  and  in  all  these  particulars  he 
shared  in  their  Return  to  Nature. 

This  insistence  of  Newman's  on  the  vital  char- 
acter of  truth  is  a  point,  the  importance  of  which 
cannot  be  exaggerated  when  the  attempt  is  being 
made  to  grasp  what  is  essential  in  his  psychology 
and  his  ways  of  conceiving  of  life  and  of  human 
nature.  For  him  truth  does  not  exist  primarily,  as 
for  the  formalist,  in  the  formulas  or  the  theorems 
of  text-books,  but  in  the  minds  and  the  hearts  of 
living  men.  In  these  minds  and  hearts  truth 
grows  and  spreads  in  countless  subtle  ways.  Its 
appeal  is  through  numberless  other  channels  than 
those  of  the  mind.  Man  is  for  Newman  primarily 
an  agent,  —  an  acting  creature,  —  not  an  intellect 
with  merely  accidental  relations  to  an  outer  world. 


NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER  119 

First  and  foremost  he  is  a  doer,  a  bringer  about 
of  results,  a  realizer  of  hopes  and  ambitions  and 
ideals.  He  is  a  mass  of  instincts  and  impulses,  of 
prejudices  and  passions;  and  it  is  in  response  to 
these  mighty  and  ceaselessly  operating  springs  of 
action  that  he  makes  his  way  through  the  ■world 
and  subdues  it  to  himself.  Truth,  then,  to  com- 
mend itself  to  such  a  being,  must  come  not  merely 
by  way  of  the  brain,  but  also  by  that  of  the  heart; 
it  must  not  be  a  collection  of  abstract  formulas, 
but  must  be  concrete  and  vital.  If  it  be  religious 
truth,  it  must  not  take  the  form  of  logical  demon- 
strations, but  must  be  beautifully  enshrined  in  the 
symbols  of  an  elaborate  ritual,  illustrated  in  the 
lives  of  saints  and  doctors,  authoritative  and  ven- 
erable in  the  creeds  and  liturgies  of  a  hierarchical 
organization,  irresistibly  cogent  as  inculcated  by 
the  divinely  appointed  representatives  of  the 
Source  of  all  Truth.  In  these  forms  religious 
truth  may  be  able  to  impose  itself  upon  individuals, 
to  take  complete  possession  of  them,  to  master 
their  minds  and  hearts,  and  to  rule  their  lives. 

But  what  shall  be  the  test  of  such  truth?  How 
shall  the  individual  be  sure  of  its  claims?  How 
shall  he  choose  between  rival  systems?  Here, 
again,  Newman  refuses  to  be  content  with  the 
formal  and  the  abstract,  and  goes  straight  to  life 
itself.  In  the  search  for  a  criterion  of  truth  he 
rejects  purely  intellectual  tests,  and  has  recourse 
to  tests  which  call  into  activity  the  whole  of  a 


120  NEWMAN  AS  A  PROSE-WRITER 

man's  nature.  It  is  the  Illative  Sense  that  detects 
and  distinguishes  truth,  and  the  Illative  Sense  is 
simply  the  entire  mind  of  the  individual  vigor- 
ously grasping  concrete  facts  with  all  their  impli- 
cations for  the  heart  and  for  the  imagination  and 
for  conduct,  and  extracting  their  peculiar  signifi- 
cance. This  process,  by  which  the  individual 
searches  for  and  attains  truth  in  concrete  matters, 
is  admirably  described  in  the  passage  quoted  in 
the  second  chapter  of  the  present  Study,  where 
the  truth-seeker's  progress  is  likened  to  that  of 
a  mountain-climber  scaling  a  crag.  The  whole 
nature  of  a  man  must  be  put  into  play,  if  truth  is 
to  be  won.  The  formal  logic  of  the  schools  falls 
short  of  life ;  its  symbols  are  general  terms,  colour- 
less abstractions,  from  which  all  the  palpitating 
warmth  and  persuasiveness  of  real  life  have  been 
carefully  drained.  Propositions  fashioned  out  of 
these  colourless  general  terms  cannot  by  any  pro- 
cess of  syllogistic  jugglery  be  made  to  comprehend 
the  whole  truth  of  a  religious  system.  They  leave 
out  inevitably  what  is  most  vital,  and  what  is 
therefore  most  intimate  in  its  appeal  to  the  indi- 
vidual, —  to  his  heart  and  practical  instincts,  and 
his  imagination.  "We  proceed  as  far  indeed  as 
we  can,  by  the  logic  of  language,  but  we  are 
obliged  to  supplement  it  by  the  more  subtle  and 
elastic  logic  of  thought ;  for  forms  by  themselves 
prove  nothing."1     "It  is  to  the  living  mind  that 

1  Grammar  of  Assent.,  ed.  1889,  p.  359. 


NEWMAN  AS  A   PROSE-WRITER  121 

we  must  look  for  the  means  of  using  correctly 
principles  of  whatever  kind."1  "In  all  of  these 
separate  actions  of  the  intellect,  the  individual  is 
supreme  and  responsible  to  himself,  nay,  under 
circumstances,  may  be  justified  in  opposing  him- 
self to  the  judgment  of  the  whole  world;  though 
he  uses  rules  to  his  great  advantage,  as  far  as  they 
go,  and  is  in  consequence  bound  to  use  them."2 
Absolute  "proof  can  never  be  furnished  to  us  by 
the  logic  of  words,  for  as  certitude  is  of  the  mind, 
so  is  the  act  of  inference  which  leads  to  it.  Every 
one  who  reasons  is  his  own  centre."3  The  prog- 
ress of  the  individual  "is  a  living  growth,  not  a 
mechanism;  and  its  instruments  are  mental  acts, 
not  the  formulas  and  contrivances  of  language."  4 

The  foregoing  analysis  has  tended  to  illustrate 
the  facts  that  Newman  aimed  to  make  religion  an 
intensely  concrete,  personal  experience,  and  to 
fill  out  the  spiritual  life  with  widely  varying  and 
richly  beautiful  feeling;  and  that  he  also  set  him- 
self everywhere,  consciously  and  directly,  against 
the  eighteenth  century  ideal,  according  to  which 
reason  was  the  sole  discoverer  and  arbiter  of  truth 
and  regulator  of  conduct.  In  these  respects,  New- 
man's work  was  in  perfect  harmony  with  that  of 
the  Romanticists.  Like  them  he  was  pleading  for 
the  spontaneous,  for  the  emotions  and  the  imagina- 
tion, for  what  is  most  vital  in  life,  in  opposition  to 

1  Grammar  of  Assent,  ed.  1889,  p.  360.        3  Ibid.,  p.  345. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  353.  *  Ibidti  p.  350. 


122  NEWMAN   AS   A   PROSE-WRITER 

the  formalists,  the  systeinatizers,  and  the  devotees 
of  logic. 

In  the  following  points,  then,  Newman's  kinship 
with  the  Eomanticists  is  recognizable:  in  his  im- 
aginative sympathy  with  the  past,  in  the  rangg! 
and  perspective  of  his  historical  consciousness,/ 
and  in  his  devotion  to  an  ideal  framed  largely  in' 
accordance  with  a  loving  reverence  for  mediaeval] 
life.  His  vein  of  mysticism,  his  imaginative  sym- 
pathy with  Nature,  his  interpretation  of  Nature  as 
symbolic  of  spiritual  truth,  his  rejection  of  reason 
as  the  guide  of  life,  and  his  recognition  of  the  in- 
adequacy of  generalizations  and  formulas  to  the 
wealth  of  actual  life  and  to  the  intensity  and  va- 
riety of  personal  experience,  are  also  characteristics 
that  mark  his  relation  to  the  men  of  his  period. 

Finally,  his  very  style  in  the  narrowest  meaning 
of  the  term  also  classes  Newman  among  Komantic 
writers.  His  debt  to  De  Quincey  has  already  been 
noted.  Though  he  is  rarely,  if  ever,  so  ornate  as 
De  Quincey,  and  though  he  perhaps  never  weaves 
his  prose  into  such  a  lustrous,  shining  surface 
through  the  continual  use  of  sensations  and  images 
as  does  De  Quincey  in  his  impassioned  prose,  yet 
the  glowing  beauty,  the  picture-making  power,  the 
occasional  imaginative  splendour,  the  elaborate 
swelling  music  of  Newman's  writings,  place  him 
as  a  master  of  prose  in  the  same  group  with  De 
Quincey,  and  Ruskin,  and  Carlyle,  and  part  him 
from  Landor,   or  Macaulay,   or  Matthew  Arnold. 


NEWMAN   AS   A  PROSE-WRITER  123 

No  prose  can  more  surely  send  quivering  over 
the  nerves  a  sense  of  the  shadowing  mystery 
of  life,  than  certain  of  Newman's  sermons,  and 
passages  here  and  there  in  his  Apologia  and 
in  his  Essays.  Through  the  play,  then,  of  his 
imagination,  its  rhythms  and  beat  of  the  wing, 
because  of  the  ease  with  which  in  a  moment  his 
prose  can  carry  the  reader  into  regions  of  impas- 
sioned and  mystical  feeling,  even  because  of  the 
vital,  intimate  warmth  and  colour  of  his  phrasing, 

—  qualities  so  different  from  the  hard,  external 
glitter  of  Macaulay's  specific,  but  rhetorical  style, 

—  Newman  reveals  his  kinship  with  the  great 
group  of  poets  and  prose-writers  who  deepened  and 
enriched  the  imaginative  life  of  the  early  part  of 
our  century.  Ecclesiasticism  and  Academicism 
are  proverbially  conservative  powers.  It  may  be 
for  this  reason  that  the  new  spiritual  forces  of 
Romanticism  did  not  renovate  the  Church  through 
the  Oxford  movement  until  a  full  generation  after 
they  had  made  almost  wholly  their  own  the  purely 
imaginative  literature  and  life  of  the  English 
nation. 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD 
i 

Admirers  of  Arnold's  prose  find  it  well  to  admit 
frankly  that  his  style  has  an  unfortunate  knack 
of  exciting  prejudice.  Emerson  has  somewhere 
spoken  of  the  unkind  trick  fate  plays  a  man  when 
it  gives  him  a  strut  in  his  gait.  Here  and  there 
in  Arnold's  prose,  there  is  just  a  trace  —  some- 
times more  than  a  trace  —  of  such  a  strut.  He 
condescends  to  his  readers  with  a  gracious  elabo- 
rateness; he  is  at  great  pains  to  make  them  feel 
that  they  are  his  equals;  he  undervalues  himself 
playfully ;  he  assures  us  that  "  he  is  an  unlearned 
bellettristic  trifler  " ;  he  insists  over  and  over  again 
that  "he  is  an  unpretending  writer,  without  a 
philosophy  based  on  interdependent,  subordinate, 
and  coherent  principles."  All  this  he  does  smil- 
ingly ;  but  the  smile  seems  to  many  on  whom  its 
favours  fall,  supercilious;  and  the  playful  under- 
valuation of  self  looks  shrewdly  like  an  affectation. 
He  is  very  debonair,  —  this  apologetic  writer,  very 
self-assured,  at  times  even  jaunty. 

Stanch  admirers  of  Arnold  have  always  rel- 
ished this  strain  in  his  style;  they  have  enjoyed 

124 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  125 

its  delicate  challenge,  the  nice  duplicity  of  its  in- 
nuendoes; they  have  found  its  insinuations  and  its 
covert,  satirical  humour  infinitely  entertaining  and 
stimulating.  Moreover,  however  seriously  dis- 
posed they  may  be,  however  exacting  of  all  the 
virtues  from  the  author  of  their  choice,  they  have 
been  able  to.  reconcile  their  enjoyment  of  Arnold 
with  their  serious  inclinations,  for  they  have  been 
confident  that  these  tricks  of  manner  implied  no 
essential  or  radical  defect  in  Arnold's  humanity, 
no  lack  either  of  sincerity  or  of  earnestness  or  of 
broad  sympathy. 

Such  admirers  and  interpreters  of  Arnold  have 
been  amply  justified  of  their  confidence  since  the 
publication  in  1895  of  Arnold's  Letters.  The 
Arnold  of  these  letters  is  a  man  the  essential 
integrity  —  ivholeness  —  of  whose  nature  is  incon- 
testable. His  sincerity,  kindliness,  wide-ranging 
sympathy  with  all  classes  of  men  are  unmistaka- 
bly expressed  on  every  page  of  his  correspondence. 
We  see  him  having  to  do  with  people  widely  diverse 
in  their  relations  to  him :  with  those  close  of  kin, 
with  chance  friends,  with  many  men  of  business 
or  officials,  with  a  wide  circle  of  literary  acquaint- 
ances, with  workingmen,  and  with  foreign  savants. 
In  all  his  intercourse  the  same  sweet-tempered 
frankness  and  the  same  readiness  of  sympathy  are 
manifest.  There  is  never  a  trace  of  the  duplicity 
or  the  treacherous  irony  that  are  to  be  found  in 
much  of  his  prose. 


126  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

Moreover,  the  record  that  these  Letters  contain 
of  close  application  to  uncongenial  tasks  must  have 
been  a  revelation  to  many  readers  who  have  had 
to  rely  upon  books  for  their  knowledge  of  literary 
men.  Popular  caricatures  of  Arnold  had  repre- 
sented him  as  "a  high  priest  of  the  kid-glove  per- 
suasion," as  an  incorrigible  dilettante,  a  literary 
fop  idling  his  time  away  over  poetry  and  recom- 
mending the  parmaceti  of  culture  as  the  sovereign- 
est  thing  in  nature  for  the  inward  bruises  of  the 
spirit.  This  conception  of  Arnold,  if  it  has  at  all 
maintained  itself,  certainly  cannot  survive  the 
revelations  of  the  Letters.  The  truth  is  beyond 
cavil  that  he  was  among  the  most  self-sacrificingly 
laborious  men  of  his  time. 

For  a  long  period  of  years  Arnold  held  the  post 
of  inspector  of  schools.  Day  after  day,  and  week 
after  week,  he  gave  up  one  of  the  finest  of  minds, 
one  of  the  most  sensitive  of  temperaments,  one  of 
the  most  delicate  of  literary  organizations,  to  the 
drudgery  of  examining  in  its  minutest  details  the 
work  of  the  schools  in  such  elementary  subjects  as 
mathematics  and  grammar.  On  January  7,  1863, 
he  writes  to  his  mother,  "  I  am  now  at  the  work  I 
dislike  most  in  the  world  —  looking  over  and  mark- 
ing examination  papers.  I  was  stopped  last  week 
by  my  eyes,  and  the  last  year  or  two  these  sixty 
papers  a  day  of  close  handwriting  to  read  have,  I 
am  sorry  to  say,  much  tried  my  eyes  for  the  time." 
Two  years  later  he  laments  again:    "I  am  being 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  127 

driven  furious  by  seven  hundred  closely  written 
grammar  papers,  which  I  have  to  look  over." 
During  these  years  he  was  holding  the  Chair  of 
Poetry  at  Oxford,  and  he  had  long  since  estab- 
lished his  reputation  as  one  of  the  foremost  of  the 
younger  poets.  Yet  for  a  livelihood  he  was  forced 
still  to  endure  —  and  he  endured  them  till  within 
a  few  years  of  his  death  in  1888  —  the  exactions 
of  this  wearing  and  exasperating  drudgery.  More- 
over, despite  occasional  outbursts  of  impatience, 
he  gave  himself  to  the  work  freely,  heartily,  and 
effectively.  He  was  sent  on  several  occasions  to 
the  Continent  to  examine  and  report  on  foreign 
school  systems;  his  reports  on  German  and  French 
education  show  immense  diligence  of  investigation, 
a  thorough  grasp  of  detail,  and  patience  and  per- 
sistence in  the  acquisition  of  facts  that  in  and  for 
themselves  must  have  been  unattractive  and  un- 
rewarding. 

The  record  of  this  severe  labour  is  to  be  found 
in  Arnold's  Letters,  and  it  must  dispose  once  for 
all  of  any  charge  that  he  was  a  mere  dilettante 
and  coiner  of  phrases.  Through  a  long  period  of 
years  he  was  working  diligently,  wearisomely,  in 
minutely  practical  ways,  to  better  the  educational 
system  of  England;  he  was  persistently  striving 
both  to  spread  sounder  ideals  of  elementary  edu- 
cation and  to  make  more  effective  the  system  actu- 
ally in  vogue.  And  thus,  unpretentiously  and 
laboriously,  he  was  serving  the  cause  of  sweetness 


128  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

and  light  as  well  as  through  his  somewhat  debonair 
contributions  to  literature. 

In  another  way  his  Letters  have  done  much  to 
reveal  the  innermost  core  of  Arnold's  nature,  and 
so,  ultimately,  to  explain  the  genesis  of  his  prose. 
They  place  it  beyond  doubt  that  in  all  he  wrote 
Arnold  had  an  underlying  purpose,  clearly  appre- 
hended and  faithfully  pursued.  In  1867,  in  a 
letter  to  his  mother,  he  says:  "I  more  and  more 
become  conscious  of  having  something  to  do  and 
of  a  resolution  to  do  it.  .  .  .  Whether  one  lives 
long  or  not,  to  be  less  and  less  personal  in  one's 
desires  and  workings  is  the  great  matter."  In  a 
letter  of  1863  he  had  already  written  in  much  the 
same  strain:  "However,  one  cannot  change  Eng- 
lish ideas  as  much  as,  if  I  live,  I  hope  to  change 
them,  without  saying  imperturbably  what  one 
thinks,  and  making  a  good  many  people  uncom- 
fortable." And  in  a  letter  of  the  same  year  he 
exclaims :  "  It  is  very  animating  to  think  that  one 
at  last  has  a  chance  of  getting  at  the  English  pub- 
lic. Such  a  public  as  it  is,  and  such  a  work  as  one 
wants  to  do  with  it."  A  work  to  do!  The  phrase 
recalls  Cardinal  Newman  and  the  well-known 
anecdote  of  his  Sicilian  illness,  when  through  all 
the  days  of  greatest  danger  he  insisted  that  he 
should  get  well  because  he  had  a  work  to  do  in 
England.  Despite  Arnold's  difference  in  tempera- 
ment from  Newman  and  the  widely  dissimilar  task 
he  proposed  to  himself,  he  was  no  less  in  earnest 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  129 

than  Newman,  and  no  less  convinced  of  the  impor- 
tance of  his  task. 

The  occasional  supercilious  jauntiness  of  Ar- 
nold's style,  then,  need  not  trouble  even  the  most 
conscientious  of  his  admirers.  To  many  of  his 
readers  it  is  in  itself,  as  has  been  already  sug- 
gested, delightfully  stimulating.  Others,  the 
more  conscientious  folk  and  perhaps  also  the 
severer  judges  of  literary  quality,  are  bound  to 
find  it  artistically  a  blemish;  but  they  need  not 
at  any  rate  regard  it  as  implying  any  radical  de- 
fect in  Arnold's  humanity  or  as  the  result  of  cheap 
cynicism  or  of  inadequate  sympathy.  In  point  of 
fact,  the  true  account  of  the  matter  seems  rather 
to  lie  in  the  paradox  that  the  apparent  supercili- 
ousness of  Arnold's  style  comes  from  the  very 
intensity  of  his  moral  earnestness,  and  that  the 
imperfections  of  his  manner  are  often  the  result 
of  an  over-conscientious  desire  to  conciliate. 


II 

What,  then,  was  Arnold's  controlling  purpose 
in  his  prose-writing?  What  was  the  "work"  that 
he  "wanted  to  do  with  the  English  public"?  In 
trying  to  find  answers  to  these  questions  recourse 
will  first  be  had  to  stray  phrases  in  Arnold's 
prose;  these  phrases  will  give  incidental  glimpses, 
from  different  points  of  view,  of  his  central  idealy 
later,  their  fragmentary  suggestions  will  be  brought 


130  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

together  into  something  like  a  comprehensive 
formula. 

In  the  lectures  on  Celtic  Literature  Arnold  points 
out,  in  closing,  that  it  has  been  his  aim  to  lead 
Englishmen  to  "reunite  themselves  with  their 
better  mind  and  with  the  world  through  science  " ; 
that  he  has  sought  to  help  them  "conquer  the  hard 
unintelligence,  which  was  just  then  their  bane;  to 
supple  and  reduce  it  by  culture,  by  a  growth  in  the 
variety,  fulness,  and  sweetness  of  their  spiritual 
life."  In  the  Preface  to  his  first  volume  of  Essays 
he  explains  that  he  is  trying  "to  pull  out  a  few 
more  stops  in  that  powerful,  but  at  present  some- 
what narrow-toned  organ,  the  modern  English- 
man." In  Culture  and  Anarchy  he  assures  us  that 
his  object  is  to  convince  men  of  the  value  of  "  cult- 
ure " ;  to  incite  them  to  the  pursuit  of  "  perfec- 
tion " ;  to  help  "  make  reason  and  the  will  of  God 
prevail."  And,  again,  in  the  same  work  he  de- 
clares that  he  is  striving  to  intensify  throughout 
England  "  the  impulse  to  the  development  of  the 
whole  man,  to  connecting  and  harmonizing  all  parts 
of  him,  perfecting  all,  leaving  none  to  take  their 
chance." 

These  phrases  give,  often  with  capricious  pictu- 
resqueness,  hints  of  the  prevailing  intention  with 
which  Arnold  writes.  They  may  well  be  supple- 
mented by  a  series  of  phrases  in  which,  in  simi- 
larly picturesque  fashion,  he  finds  fault  with  life 
as  it  actually  exists   in  England,  with  the  indi- 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  131 

vidual  Englishman  as  he  encounters  him  from  day 
to  day;  these  phrases,  through  their  critical  im- 
plications, also  reveal  the  purpose  that  is  always 
present  in  Arnold's  mind,  when  he  addresses  his 
countrymen.  "Provinciality,"  Arnold  points  out 
as  a  widely  prevalent  and  injurious  characteristic 
of  English  literature ;  it  argues  a  lack  of  centrality, 
carelessness  of  ideal  excellence,  undue  devotion  to 
relatively  unimportant  matters.  Again,  "arbi- 
trariness "  and  "  eccentricity  "  are  noticeable  traits 
both  of  English  literature  and  scholarship;  Arnold 
finds  them  everywhere  deforming  Professor  New- 
man's interpretations  of  Homer,  and  he  further 
comments  on  them  as  in  varying  degrees  "  the  great 
defect  of  English  intellect  — the  great  blemish  of 
English  literature."  In  religion  he  takes  special 
exception  to  the  "loss  of  totality"  that  results 
from  sectarianism ;  this  is  the  penalty,  Arnold  con- 
tends, that  the  Nonconformist  pays  for  his  hos- 
tility to  the  established  church;  in  his  pursuit 
of  his  own  special  enthusiasm  the  Nonconformist 
becomes,  like  Ephraim,  "a  wild  ass  alone  by 
himself."  — ^ 

From  all  these  brief  quotations  this  much  at  \ 
least  is  plain,  that  what  Arnold  is  continually 
recommending  is  the  complete  development  of  the 
human  type,  and  that  what  he  is  condemning  is  [ 
departure  from  some  finely  conceived  ideal  of 
human  excellence  —  from  some  scheme  of  human 
nature  in  which  all  its  powers  have  full  and  har- 


132  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

monious  play.  The  various  phrases  that  have  been 
quoted,  alike  the  positive  and  the  negative  ones, 
imply,  as  Arnold's  continual  purpose  in  his  prose- 
writings,  the  recommendation  of  this  ideal  of 
human  excellence  and  the  illustration  of  the  evils 
that  result  from  its  neglect.  Evidently,  his  im- 
agination is  haunted  by  some  symmetrical  scheme 
of  character  —  by  some  exquisitely  conceived  pat- 
tern of  perfection  —  wherein  manners  and  know- 
ledge, and  passion  and  religion,  all  have  their  due 
value,  and  work  together  for  righteousness.  With 
this  scheme  in  mind,  he  goes  through  the  length 
and  breadth  of  England,  scanning  each  class  of 
men  he  meets,  and  questioning  how  far  its  mem- 
bers conform  to  his  type.  And  his  continual 
purpose  is  to  stir  in  the  minds  of  his  fellow- 
countrymen  as  keen  a  sense  as  may  be  of  the 
value  of  this  perfect  type  and  of  the  dangers  of 
disregarding  it.  The  significance  and  the  scope 
of  this  purpose  will  become  clearer  if  we  consider 
some  of  the  imperfect  ideals  that  Arnold  finds 
operative  in  place  of  his  absolute  ideal,  and  note 
their  misleading  and  depraving  effects.  -"* 

One  such  partial  ideal  is  the  worship  of  the  ex-  ^ 
cessively  practical  and  the  relentlessly  utilitarian  I 
as  the  only  things  in  life  worth  while.  England  * 
is  a  prevailingly  practical  nation,  and  our  age  is  a  . 
prevailingly  practical  age ;  the  unregenerate  prod-  i 
uct  of  this  nation  and  age  is  the  Philistine,  and  ', 
against  the  Philistine  Arnold  never  wearies   of 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  133 

inveighing.  The  Philistine  is  the  swaggering 
enemy  of  the  children  of  light,  of  the  chosen 
people,  of  those  who  love  art  and  ideas  disinter- 
estedly. The  Philistine  cares  solely  for  business, 
for  developing  the  material  resources  of  the  coun- 
try, for  starting  companies,  building  bridges, 
making  railways,  and  establishing  plants.  The 
machinery  of  life  —  its  material  organization  — 
monopolizes  all  his  attention.  He  judges  of  life 
by  the  outside,  and  is  careless  of  the  things  of  the 
spirit.  The  Philistine  may,  of  course,  be  religious ; 
but  his  religion  is  as  materialistic  as  his  every-day 
existence;  his  heaven  is  a  triumph  of  engineering 
skill,  and  his  ideal  of  future  bliss  is,  in  Sydney 
Smith's  phrase,  to  eat  "p&tes  de  foie  gras  to  the 
sound  of  trumpets."  Against  men  of  this  class 
Arnold  cannot  show  himself  too  cynically  severe. 
Th#y  are  pitiful  distortions ;  the  practical  instincts 
have  usurped,  and  have  destroyed  the  symmetry 
and  integrity  of  the  human  type.  The  senses  and 
the  will  to  live  are  monopolizing  and  determine  all 
the  man's  energy  toward  utilitarian  ends.  The 
power  of  beauty,  the  power  of  intellect  and  know- 
ledge, the  power  of  social  manners,  are  atrophied. 
Society  is  in  serious  danger  unless  men  of  this 
class  can  be  touched  with  a  sense  of  their  short- 
comings ;  made  aware  of  the  larger  values  of  life ; 
made  pervious  to  ideas;  brought  to  recognize  the 
importance  of  the  things  of  the  mind  and  the  spirit. 
Another  partial  ideal,  the  prevalence  of  which 


134  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

Arnold  laments,    is   the  narrowly   and  unintelli- 
gently  religious  ideal.     The  middle-class  English- 
man is,  according  to  Arnold,  a  natural  "  Hebraist " ; 
his  whole  energy  is  spent,  when  he  is  at  his  best, 
in  the  struggle  to  obey  certain  traditional  rules  of 
morality.     In  the  origin  of  these  rules,  or  in  the 
question  as  to  whether  or  no  they  be  founded  in 
right  reason,  he  has  little  or  no  interest.     In  gen- 
eral, he  is  careless  or  contemptuous  of  speculation 
and  of  whatever  savours  of  philosophy.     He  is 
intent  upon  the  fulfilment  of  a  conventional  code 
of  duty.     Conduct,  narrowly  conceived,  is  his  only 
concern  in  life.     Beauty  has  no  charm  for  him; 
art,  no  meaning.    The  free  play  of  mind  in  the  dis- 
interested pursuit  of  truth  seems  waste  of  energy 
or  even  vicious  self-assertion.     All  the  bright  irre- 
sponsibility, the  sparkling  delight  in  life  and  in 
thought  for  their  own  sakes,  that  are  characteristic 
of  what  Arnold  calls  the  "  Hellenistic  "  temper  — 
its  burning  eagerness  to  know,  its  strenuous  will 
to  be  sure  that  its  truth  is  really  truth  —  all  these 
qualities  and  instincts  seem  to  the  Hebraist  abnor- 
mal, pagan,  altogether  evil.    The  Puritanism  of  the 
seventeenth  century  was  the  almost  unrestricted 
expression  of  the  Hebraistic  temper,  and  from  the 
conceptions  of  life  that  were  then  wrought  out  the 
middle  classes  in  England  have  never  wholly  es- 
caped.    The  Puritans  looked  out  upon  life  with  a 
narrow  vision,  recognized  only  a  few  of  its  varied 
interests,  and  provided  for  the  needs  of  only  a  part 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  135 

of  man's  nature.  Yet  their  theories  and  concep- 
tions of  life  —  theories  and  conceptions  that  were 
limited  in  the  first  place  by  the  age  in  which  they 
originated,  and  in  the  second  place  by  a  Hebraistic 
lack  of  sensitiveness  to  the  manifold  charm  of 
beauty  and  knowledge  —  these  limited  theories  and 
conceptions  have  imposed  themselves  constrain- 
ingly  on  many  generations  of  Englishmen.  To- 
day they  remain,  in  all  their  narrowness  and  with 
an  ever-increasing  disproportion  to  existing  con- 
ditions, the  most  influential  guiding  principles  of 
large  masses  of  men.  Such  men  spend  their  lives 
in  a  round  of  petty  religious  meetings  and  employ- 
ments. They  think  all  truth  is  summed  up  in 
their  little  cut-and-dried  Biblical  interpretations. 
New  truth  is  uninteresting  or  dangerous.  Art  dis- 
tracts from  religion,  and  is  a  siren  against  whose 
seductive  chanting  the  discreet  religious  Ulysses 
seals  his  ears.  To  Arnold  this  whole  view  of  life 
seems  sadly  mistaken,  and  the  men  who  hold  it 
seem  fantastic  distortions  of  the  authentic  human 
type.  The  absurdities  and  the  dangers  of  the  un- 
restricted Hebraistic  ideal  he  satirizes  or  laments 
in  Culture  and  Anarchy,  in  Literature  and  Dogma, 
in  God  and  the  Bible,  and  in  St.  Paul  and  Prot- 
estantism. 

Still  another  kind  of  deformity  arises  when  the 
intellect  grows  self-assertive  and  develops  over- 
weeningly.  To  this  kind  of  distortion  the  modern 
man  of  science  is  specially  prone;  his  exclusive 


136  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

study  of  material  facts  leads  to  crude,  unregenerate 
strength  of  intellect,  and  leaves  him  careless  of  the 
value  truth  may  have  for  the  spirit  and  of  its 
glimmering  suggestions  of  beauty.  Yes,  and  for 
the  philosopher  and  the  scholar,  too,  over-intel- 
lectualism  has  its  peculiar  dangers.  The  devotee 
of  a  system  of  thought  is  apt  to  lose  touch  with  the 
real  values  of  life,  and  in  his  exorbitant  desire  for 
unity  and  thoroughness  of  organization,  to  miss 
the  free  play  of  vital  forces  that  gives  to  life  its 
manifold  charm,  its  infinite  variety,  and  its  ulti- 
mate reality.  Bentham  and  Comte  are  examples 
of  the  evil  effects  of  this  rabid  pursuit  of  system. 
"  Culture  is  always  assigning  to  system-makers  and 
systems  a  smaller  share  in  the  bent  of  human  des- 
tiny than  their  friends  like."  As  for  the  pedant, 
he  is  merely  the  miser  of  facts,  who  grows  with- 
ered in  hoarding  the  vain  fragments  of  precious 
ore  of  whose  use  he  has  lost  the  sense.  Men  of  all 
these  various  types  offend  through  their  fanatical 
devotion  to  truth ;  for,  indeed,  as  some  one  has  in 
recent  years  well  said,  the  intellect  is  "  but  a  par- 
vemt,"  and  the  other  powers  of  life,  despite  the 
Napoleonic  irresistibleness  of  the  new-comer,  have 
rights  that  deserve  respect.  Over-intellectualism, 
then,  like  the  over-development  of  any  other 
power,  leads  to  disproportion  and  disorder. 

Such  being  some  of  the  partial  ideals  against 
which  Arnold  warns  his  readers,  what  account  does 
he  give  of  that  perfect  human  type  in  all  its  integ- 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  137 

rity,  in  terms  of  which  he  criticises  these  aberra- 
tions or  deformities?     Perhaps  Arnold   felt  that 
any  attempt  at  an  exact  and  systematic  definition 
of   this   type  would  be  somewhat   grotesque  and 
presumptuous;  at  any  rate,   he  has  avoided  such 
an   attempt.     Still,    he   has   recorded   clearly,    in 
many  passages,  his  ideas  as  regards  the  powers  in 
man  that  are  essential  to  perfect  humanity,  and 
that  must  all  be  duly  recognized  and  developed,  if 
man  is  to  attain  in  full  scope  what  nature  offers. 
A  representative  passage  may  be  quoted  from  the 
lecture  on  Literature  and  Science :  "  When  we  set 
ourselves  to  enumerate  the  powers  which  go  to  the 
building  up  of  human  life,  and  say  that  they  are 
the  power  of  conduct,  the  power  of  intellect  and 
knowledge,  the  power  of  beauty,  and  the  power  of 
social  life  and  manners,  he  [Professor  Huxley]  can 
hardly  deny  that  this  scheme,  though  drawn  in 
rough  and  plain  lines  enough,  and  not  pretending 
to  scientific  exactness,  does  yet  give  a  fairly  true 
representation  of  the  matter.      Human  nature  is 
built  up  of  these  powers;  we  have  the  need  for 
them  all.      When  we  have  rightly  met  and  ad- 
justed the  claims  for  them  all,  we  shall  then  be  in 
a  fair  way  for  getting  soberness  and  righteousness 
with  wisdom." 

These  same  ideas  are  presented,  under  a  some- 
what different  aspect  and  with  somewhat  different 
terminology,  in  the  first  chapter  of  Culture  and 
Anarchy:  "The  great  aim  of  culture  [is]  the  aim 


138  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

of  setting  ourselves  to  ascertain  what  perfection  is 
and  to  make  it  prevail."  Culture  seeks  "the  de- 
termination of  this  question  through  all  the  voices 
of  human  experience  which  have  been  heard  upon 
it, — of  art,  science,  poetry,  philosophy,  history, 
as  well  as  of  religion,  —  in  order  to  give  a  greater 
fulness  and  certainty  to  its  solution.  .  .  .  Re- 
ligion says:  The  Kingdom  of  God  is  within  you; 
and  culture,  in  like  manner,  places  human  perfec- 
tion in  an  internal  condition,  in  the  growth  and 
predominance  of  our  humanity  proper,  as  distin- 
guished from  our  animality.  It  places  it  in  the 
ever-increasing  efficacy  and  in  the  general  har- 
monious expansion  of  those  gifts  of  thought  and 
feeling  which  make  the  peculiar  dignity,  wealth, 
and  happiness  of  human  nature.  As  I  have  said 
on  a  former  occasion:  'It  is  in  making  endless  ad- 
ditions to  itself,  in  the  endless  expansion  of  its 
powers,  in  endless  growth  in  wisdom  and  beauty, 
that  the  spirit  of  the  human  race  finds  its  ideal. 
To  reach  this  ideal,  culture  is  an  indispensable  aid, 
and  that  is  the  true  value  of  culture.'  " 

In  such  passages  as  these  Arnold  comes  as  near 
as  he  ever  comes  to  defining  the  perfect  human 
type.  He  does  not  profess  to  define  it  universally 
and  in  abstract  terms,  for  indeed  he  "  hates  "  ab- 
stractions almost  as  inveterately  as  Burke  hated 
them.  He  does  not  even  describe  concretely  for 
men  of  his  own  time  and  nation  the  precise  equi- 
poise of  powers  essential  to  perfection.     Yet  he 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  139 

names  these  powers,  suggests  the  ends  towards 
which  they  must  by  their  joint  working  contribute, 
and  illustrates,  through  examples,  the  evil  effects 
of  the  preponderance  or  absence  of  one  and  another. 
Finally,  in  the  course  of  his  many  discussions,  he 
describes  in  detail  the  method  by  which  the  deli- 
cate adjustment  of  these  rival  powers  may  be  se- 
cured in  the  typical  man;  suggests  who  is  to  be 
the  judge  of  the  conflicting  claims  of  these  powers, 
and  indicates  the  process  by  which  this  judge  may 
most  persuasively  lay  his  opinions  before  those 
whom  he  wishes  to  influence.  The  method  for 
the  attainment  of  the  perfect  type  is  culture;  the 
censor  of  defective  types  and  the  judge  of  the 
rival  claims  of  the  cooperant  powers  is  the  critic; 
and  the  process  by  which  this  judge  clarifies  his 
own  ideas  and  enforces  his  opinions  on  others  is 
criticism. 

Ill 

We  are  now  at  the  centre  of  Arnold's  theory  of 
life  and  hold  the  key  to  his  system  of  belief,  so 
far  as  he  had  a  system.  His  reasons  for  attach- 
ing to  the  work  of  the  critic  the  importance  he 
palpably  attached  to  it  are  at  once  apparent. 
Criticism  is  the  method  by  which  the  perfect  type 
of  human  nature  is  at  any  moment  to  be  appre- 
hended and  kept  in  uncontaminate  clearness  of 
outline  before  the  popular  imagination.  The  ideal 
critic  is  the  man  of  nicest  discernment  in  matters 


140  MATTHEW   AKNOLD 

intellectual,    moral,    aesthetic,    social;    of   perfect' 
equipoise  of  powers;  of  delicately  pervasive  sym- » 
pathy;  of  imaginative  insight;  who  grasps  com-  ( 
prehensively  the  whole  life  of  his  time ;  who  feels  • 
its  vital  tendencies  and  is  intimately  aware  of  its_; 
most  insistent  preoccupations;  who  also  keeps  his 
orientation  towards  the  unchanging  norms  of  human 
endeavour;  and  who  is  thus  able  to  note  and  set 
forth  the  imperfections  in  existing  types  of  human 
nature  and  to  urge  persuasively  a  return  in  essen- 
tial particulars  to  the  normal  type.     The  function 
of  criticism,  then,  is  the  vindication  of  the  ideal 
human  type  against  perverting  influences,  and  Ar- 
nold's  prose-writings  will  for  the  most  part  be 
found  to  have  been  inspired  in  one  form  or  another 
by  a  single  purpose:  the  correction  of  excess  in 
some  human  activity  and  the  restoration  of  that 
activity  to  its  proper  place  among  the  powers  that 
make  up  the  ideal  human  type. 

Culture  and  Anarchy  (1869)  was  the  first  of 
Arnold's  books  to  illustrate  adequately  this  far- 
reaching  conception  of  criticism.  His  special  topic 
is,  in  this  case,  social  conditions  in  England.  Pol- 
iticians, he  urges,  whose  profession  it  is  to  deal 
with  social  questions,  are  engrossed  in  practical 
matters  and  biassed  by  party  considerations;  they 
lack  the  detachment  and  breadth  of  view  to  see 
the  questions  at  issue  in  their  true  relations  to 
abstract  standards  of  right  and  wrong.  They  mis- 
take means  for  ends,  machinery  for  the  results  that 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  141 

machinery  is  meant  to  secure ;  they  lose  all  sense 
of  values  and  exalt  temporary  measures  into  mat- 
ters of  sacred  import;  finally,  they  come  to  that 
pass  of  ineptitude  which  Arnold  symbolizes  by  the 
enthusiasm  of  Liberals  over  the  measure  to  enable 
a  man  to  marry  his  deceased  wife's  sister.  What 
is  needed  to  correct  these  absurd  misapprehensions 
is  the  free  play  of  critical  intelligence.  The  critic 
from  his  secure  coign  of  vantage  must  examine 
social  conditions  dispassionately;  he  must  deter- 
mine what  is  essentially  wrong  in  the  inner  lives 
of  the  various  classes  of  men  around  him,  and  so 
reveal  the  real  sources  of  those  social  evils  which 
politicians  are  trying  to  remedy  by  external  re- 
adjustments and  temporary  measures. 

And  this  is  just  the  task  that  Arnold  undertakes 
in  Culture  and  Anarchy.  He  sets  himself  to  con- 
sider English  society  in  its  length  and  breadth 
with  a  view  to  discovering  what  is  its  essential 
constitution,  what  are  the  typical  classes  that  enter 
into  it,  and  what  are  the  characteristics  of  these 
classes.  So  far  as  concerns  classification  he  ulti- 
mately accepts,  it  is  true,  as  adequate  to  his  pur- 
pose, the  traditional  division  of  English  society 
into  upper,  middle,  and  lower  classes.  But  he 
then  goes  on  to  give  an  analysis  of  each  of  these 
classes  that  is  novel,  penetrating,  in  the  highest 
degree  stimulating.  He  takes  a  typical  member 
of  each  class  and  describes  him  in  detail,  intellectu- 
ally, morally,  socially;  he  points  out  his  sources 


142  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

of  strength  and  his  sources  of  weakness.  He 
compares  him  as  a  type  with  the  abstract  ideal  of 
human  excellence,  and  notes  wherein  his  powers 
"fall  short  or  exceed."  He  indicates  the  reaction 
upon  the  social  and  political  life  of  the  nation  of 
these  various  defects  and  excesses,  their  inevitable 
influence  in  producing  social  misadjustment  and 
friction.  Finally,  he  urges  that  the  one  remedy 
that  will  correct  these  errant  social  types  and  bring 
them  nearer  to  the  perfect  human  type  is  culture, 
increase  in  vital  knowledge. 

The  details  of  Arnold's  application  of  this  con- 
ception of  culture  as  a  remedy  for  the  social  evils 
of  the  time,  every  reader  may  follow  out  for  him- 
self in  Culture  and  Anarchy.  One  point  in  Arnold's 
conception,  however,  is  to  be  noted  forthwith;  it 
is  a  crucial  point  in  its  influence  on  his  theoriz- 
ings.  By  culture  Arnold  means  increase  of  know- 
ledge ;  yes,  but  he  means  something  more ;  culture 
is  for  Arnold  not  merely  an  intellectual  matter. 
Culture  is  the  best  knowledge  made  operative  and 
dynamic  in  life  and  character.  Knowledge  must 
be  vitalized;  it  must  be  intimately  conscious  of  the 
whole  range  of  human  interests;  it  must  ulti- 
mately subserve  the  whole  nature  of  man.  Con- 
tinually, then,  as  Arnold  is  pleading  for  the  spread 
of  ideas,  for  increase  of  light,  for  the  acceptance 
on  the  part  of  his  fellow-countrymen  of  new  know- 
ledge from  the  most  diverse  sources,  he  is  as  keenly 
alive  as  any  one  to  the  dangers  of  over-intellectual- 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  143 

ism.  The  undue  development  of  the  intellectual 
powers  is  as  injurious  to  the  individual  as  any 
other  form  of  deviation  from  the  perfect  human 
type. 

This  distrust  of  over-intellectualism  is  the  ulti- 
mate ground  of  Arnold's  hostility  to  the  claims  of 
Physical  Science  to  primacy  in  modern  education. 
His  ideas  on  the  relative  educational  value  of  the 
physical  sciences  and  of   the   humanities  are  set 
forth  in  the  well-known  discourse  on  Literature  and 
Science.     Arnold  is  ready,  no  one  is  more  ready, 
to  accept  the  conclusions  of  science  on  all  topics 
that  fall  within  its  range;  whatever  its  authenti- 
cated spokesmen  have  to  say  upon  man's  origin, 
his  moral  nature,  his  relations  to  his  fellows,  his 
place  in  the  physical  universe,  his  religions,  his 
sacred  books  —  all  these  utterances  are  to  be  re- 
ceived with  entire  loyalty  as  far  as  they  can  be 
shown  to  embody  the  results  of  expert  scientific 
observation   and   thought.      But   for   Arnold,   the  \ 
great  importance  of  modern  scientific  truth  does 
not  for  a  moment  make  clear  the  superiority  of  the 
physical  sciences  over  the  humanities  as  a  means  J 
of  educational  discipline.     The  study  of  the  sci- 
ences tends  merely  to  intellectual  development,  to 
the  increase  of  mental  power;  the  study  of  litera- 
ture, on  the  other  hand,  trains  a  man  emotionally,  t 
and  morally,  develops  his  human  sympathies,  sen-  \ 
sitizes  him  temperamentally,  rouses  his  imagina-   J 
tion,  and  elicits  his  sense  of  beauty.     Science  puts 


144  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

before  the  student  the  crude  facts  of  nature,  bids 
him  accept  them  dispassionately,  rid  himself  of 
all  discolouring  moods  as  he  watches  the  play 
of  physical  force,  and  convert  himself  into  pure 
intelligence;  he  is  simply  to  observe,  to  analyze, 
to  classify,  and  to  systematize,  and  he  is  to  go 
through  these  processes  continually  with  facts 
that  have  no  human  quality,  that  come  raw  from 
the  great  whirl  of  the  cosmic  machine.  As  a  dis- 
cipline, then,  for  the  ordinary  man,  the  study  of 
science  tends  not  a  whit  towards  humanization, 
towards  refinement,  towards  temperamental  regen- 
eration; it  tends  only  to  develop  an  accurate  trick 
of  the  senses,  fine  observation,  crude  intellectual 
strength.  These  powers  are  of  very  great  impor- 
tance ;  but  they  may  also  be  trained  in  the  study 
of  literature,  while  at  the  same  time  the  student, 
as  Sir  Philip  Sidney  long  ago  pointed  out,  is  being 
led  and  drawn  "to  as  high  a  perfection  as  our 
degenerate  souls,  made  worse  by  their  clay  lodg- 
ings, can  be  capable  of."  Arnold,  then,  with 
characteristic  anxiety  for  the  integrity  of  the 
human  type,  urges  the  superior  worth  to  most 
young  men  of  a  literary  rather  than  a  scientific 
training.  Literature  nourishes  the  whole  spirit 
of  man;  science  ministers  only  to  the  intellect. 

The  same  insistent  desire  that  culture  be  vital 
is  at  the  root  of  Arnold's  discomfort  in  the  pres- 
ence of  German  scholarship.  For  the  thorough- 
ness and  the  disinterestedness  of  this  scholarship 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  145 

he  has  great  respect;  but  he  cannot  endure  its 
trick  of  losing  itself  in  the  letter,  its  "pedantry, 
slowness,"  its  way  of  "fumbling"  after  truth,  its 
"ineffectiveness."1  "In  the  German  mind,"  he 
exclaims  in  Literature  and  Dogma,  "as  in  the  Ger- 
man language,  there  does  seem  to  be  something 
splay,  something  blunt-edged,  unhandy,  infelici- 
tous, —  some  positive  want  of  straightforward, 
sure  perception."2  Of  scholarship  of  this  splay 
variety,  that  comes  from  exaggerated  intellectu- 
ality and  from  lack  of  a  delicate  temperament  and 
of  nice  perceptions,  Arnold  is  intolerant.  Such 
scholarship  he  finds  working  its  customary  mis- 
chief in  Professor  Francis  Newman's  translation 
of  Homer,  and,  accordingly,  he  gives  large  parts 
of  the  lectures  on  Translating  Homer  to  the  illus- 
tration of  its  shortcomings  and  maladroitness;  he 
is  bent  on  showing  how  inadequate  is  great  learn- 
ing alone  to  cope  with  any  nice  literary  problem. 
Newman's  philological  knowledge  of  Greek  and  of 
Homer  is  beyond  dispute,  but  his  taste  may  be 
judged  from  his  assertion  that  Homer's  verse,  if 
we  could  hear  the  living  Homer,  would  affect  us 
"like  an  elegant  and  simple  melody  from  an 
African  of  the  Gold  Coast."3  The  remedy  for 
such  inept  scholarship  lies  in  culture,  in  the  vital- 
ization  of  knowledge.     The  scholar  must  not  be  a 

1  Celtic  Literature,  p.  75. 

2  Literature  and  Dogma,  p.  xxi. 

3  On  Translating  Homer,  p.  295. 

L 


146  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

mere  knower ;  all  his  powers  must  be  harmoniously 
developed. 

A  last  illustration  of  Arnold's  insistence  that 
knowledge  be  vital  may  be  drawn  from  his  writ- 
ings on  religion  and  theology.  Again  criticism 
and  culture  are  the  passwords  that  open  the  way 
to  a  new  and  better  order  of  things.  Formulas, 
Arnold  urges,  have  fastened  themselves  constrain- 
ingly  upon  the  English  religious  mind.  Tra- 
ditional interpretations  of  the  Bible  have  come  to 
be  received  as  beyond  cavil.  These  interpretations 
are  really  human  inventions  —  the  product  of  the 
ingenious  thinking  of  theologians  like  Calvin  and 
Luther.  Yet  they  have  so  authenticated  them- 
selves that  for  most  readers  to-day  the  Bible  means 
solely  what  it  meant  for  the  exacerbated  theological 
mind  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries. 
If  religion  is  to  be  vital,  if  knowledge  of  the 
Bible  is  to  be  genuine  and  real,  there  must  be  a 
critical  examination  of  what  this  book  means  for 
the  disinterested  intelligence  of  to-day;  the  Bible, 
as  literature,  must  be  interpreted  anew,  sympa- 
thetically and  imaginatively;  the  moral  inspira- 
tion the  Bible  has  to  offer,  even  to  men  who  are 
rigidly  insistent  on  scientific  habits  of  thought  and 
standards  of  historical  truth,  must  be  disengaged 
from  what  is  unverifiable  and  transitory,  and  made 
real  and  persuasive.  "I  write,"  Arnold  declares, 
"to  convince  the  lover  of  religion  that  by  following 
habits  of  intellectual  seriousness  he  need  not,  so 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  147 

far  as  religion  is  concerned,  lose  anything.  Tak- 
ing the  Old  Testament  as  Israel's  magnificent 
establishment  of  the  theme,  Righteousness  is  salva- 
tion! taking  the  New  as  the  perfect  elucidation 
by  Jesus  of  what  righteousness  is  and  how  salva- 
tion is  won,  I  do  not  fear  comparing  even  the 
power  over  the  soul  and  imagination  of  the  Bible, 
taken  in  this  sense,  — a  sense  which  is  at  the 
same  time  solid,  —  with  the  like  power  in  the  old 
materialistic  and  miraculous  sense  for  the  Bible, 
which  is  not."1  This  definition  of  what  Arnold 
hopes  to  do  for  the  Bible  may  be  supplemented 
by  a  description  of  the  method  in  which  culture 
works  towards  the  ends  desired:  "Difficult,  cer- 
tainly, is  the  right  reading  of  the  Bible,  and 
true  culture,  too,  is  difficult.  For  true  culture 
implies  not  only  knowledge,  but  right  tact  and 
justness  of  judgment,  forming  themselves  by  and 
with  knowledge;  without  this  tact  it  is  not  true 
culture.  Difficult,  however,  as  culture  is,  it  is 
necessary.  For,  after  all,  the  Bible  is  not  a  tal- 
isman, to  be  taken  and  used  literally;  neither  is 
any  existing  church  a  talisman,  whatever  preten- 
sions of  the  sort  it  may  make,  for  giving  the  right 
interpretation  of  the  Bible.  Only  true  culture  can 
give  us  this  interpretation;  so  that  if  conduct  is, 
as  it  is,  inextricably  bound  up  with  the  Bible  and 
the  right  interpretation  of  it,  then  the  importance 
of  culture  becomes  unspeakable.     For  if  conduct  is 

1  God  and  the  Bible,  p.  xxxiv. 


148  MATTHEW  AKNOLD 

necessary  (and  there  is  nothing  so  necessary),  cult- 
ure is  necessary."1 

In  all  these  various  ways,  then,  that  have  been 
illustrated,  culture  is  a  specific  against  the  ills 
that  society  is  heir  to.  Culture  is  vital  know- 
ledge, and  the  critic  is  its  fosterer  and  guardian; 
culture  and  criticism  work  together  for  the  preser- 
vation of  the  integrity  of  the  human  type  against 
all  the  disasters  that  threaten  it  from  the  storm 
and  stress  of  modern  life.  Politics,  religion,  schol- 
arship, science,  each  has  its  special  danger  for 
the  individual;  each  seizes  upon  him,  subdues  him 
relentlessly  to  the  need  of  the  moment  and  the  re- 
quirements of  some  particular  function,  and  con- 
verts him  often  into  a  mere  distorted  fragment  of 
humanity.  Against  this  tyranny  of  the  moment, 
against  the  specializing  and  materializing  trend  of 
modern  life,  criticism  offers  a  powerful  safeguard. 
Criticism  is  ever  concerned  with  archetypal  excel- 
lence, is  continually  disengaging,  with  fine  dis- 
crimination, what  is  transitory  and  accidental  from 
what  is  permanent  and  essential  in  all  that  man 
busies  himself  about,  and  is  thus  perpetually  help- 
ing every  individual  to  the  apprehension  of  his 
"best  self,"  to  the  development  of  what  is  real  and 
absolute  and  the  elimination  of  what  is  false  or 
deforming.  And  in  doing  all  this  the  critic  acts 
as  the  appreciator  of  life;  he  is  not  the  abstract 
thinker.      He   apprehends   the    ideal  intuitively; 

1  Literature  and  Dogma,  p.  xxvii. 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  149 

he  reaches  it  by  the  help  of  the  feelings  and  the 
imagination  and  a  species  of  exquisite  tact,  not 
through  a  series  of  syllogisms ;  he  is  really  a  poet, 
rather  than  a  philosopher. 

This  conception  of  the  nature  and  functions  of 
criticism  makes  intelligible  and  justifies  a  phrase 
of  Arnold's  that  has  often  been  impugned  —  his 
description  of  poetry  as  a  criticism  of  life.  To 
this  account  of  poetry  it  has  been  objected  that 
criticism  is  an  intellectual  process,  while  poetry 
is  primarily  an  affair  of  the  imagination  and  the 
heart;  and  that  to  regard  poetry  as  a  criticism  of 
life  is  to  take  a  view  of  poetry  that  tends  to  convert 
it  into  mere  rhetorical  moralizing  —  the  decorative 
expression  in  rhythmical  language  of  abstract  truth 
about  life.  This  misinterpretation  of  Arnold's 
meaning  becomes  impossible,  if  the  foregoing 
theory  of  criticism  be  borne  in  mind.  Criticism  is 
the  determination  and  the  representation  of  the 
archetypal,  of  the  ideal.  Moreover,  it  is  not  a  de- 
termination of  the  archetypal  formally  and  theo- 
retically, through  speculation  or  the  enumeration 
of  abstract  qualities;  Arnold's  disinclination  for 
abstractions  has  been  repeatedly  noted.  The  pro- 
cess to  be  used  in  criticism  is  a  vital  process  of 
appreciation,  in  which  the  critic,  sensitive  to  the 
whole  value  of  human  life,  to  the  appeal  of  art  and 
of  conduct  and  of  manners  as  well  as  of  abstract 
truth,  feels  his  way  to  a  synthetic  grasp  upon  what 
is  ideally  best,  and  portrays  this  concretely  and 


\ 


150  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

persuasively  for  the  popular  imagination.     Such 
an  appreciator  of  life,    if   he  produce   beauty  in 
verse,  if  he  embody  his  vision  of  the  ideal  in  metre, 
will  be  a  poet.     In  other  words,  the  poet  is  the 
appreciator  of  human  life  who  sees  in   it   most 
sensitively,    inclusively,    and   penetratingly  what 
is  archetypal,  and  evokes  his  vision  before  others 
through  rhythm  and  rhyme.     In  this  sense  poetry 
can  hardly  be  denied  to  be  a  criticism  of  life ;  it  is 
the  winning  portrayal  of  the  ideal  of  human  life 
as  this  ideal  shapes  itself  in  the  mind  of  the  poet. 
Such  a  criticism  of  life  Dante  gives,  a  determina- 
tion and  portrayal  of  what  is  ideally  best  in  life 
according  to  mediaeval  conceptions;  a  representa- 
tion of  life  in  its  integrity  with  a  due  adjustment 
of  the  claims  of  all  the  powers  that  enter  into  it  — 
friendship,  ambition,  patriotism,  loyalty,  religion, 
artistic   ardour,   love.      Such  a  criticism   of   life 
Shakespeare  incidentally  gives  in  terms  of  the  full 
scope  of  Elizabethan  experience  in  England,  with 
due  imaginative  setting  forth  of  the  splendid  vistas 
of  possible   achievement  and  unlimited  develop- 
ment that  the  new  knowledge  and  the  discoveries 
of   the   Renaissance   had  opened.     In   short,    the 
great  poet  is  the  typically  sensitive,  penetrative, 
and  suggestive  appreciator  of  life, — who  calls  to 
his  aid,  to  make  his  appreciation  as  resonant  and 
persuasive  as  possible,  as  potent  as  possible  over 
men's  minds  and  hearts,   all  the   emotional   and 
imaginative  resources  of  language,  —  rhythm,  fig- 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  151 

ares,  allegory,  symbolism,  —  whatever  will  enable 
him  to  impose  his  appreciation  of  life  upon  others 
and  to  insinuate  into  their  souls  his  sense  of  the 
relative  values  of  human  acts  and  characters  and 
passions;  whatever  will  help  him  to  make  more 
overweeningly  beautiful  and  insistently  eloquent 
his  vision  of  truth  and  beauty.  In  this  sense  the  , 
poet  is  the  limiting  ideal  of  the  appreciative  critic, 
and  poetry  is  the  ultimate  criticism  of  life  —  the 
finest  portrayal  each  age  can  attain  to  of  what 
seems  to  it  in  life  most  significant  and  delightful. 

The  purpose  with  which  Arnold  writes  is  now 
fairly  apparent.  His  aim  is  to  shape  in  happy 
fashion  the  lives  of  his  fellows ;  to  free  them  from 
the  bonds  that  the  struggle  for  existence  imposes 
upon  them;  to  enlarge  their  horizons,  to  enrich 
them  spiritually,  and  to  call  all  that  is  best  within 
them  into  as  vivid  play  as  possible.  When  we 
turn  to  Arnold's  literary  criticism  we  shall  find 
this  purpose  no  less  paramount. 

A  glance  through  the  volumes  of  Arnold's  essays 
renders  it  clear  that  his  selection  of  a  poet  or  a. 
prose-writer  for  discussion  was  usually  made  with 
a  view  to  putting  before  English  readers  some 
desirable  trait  of  character  for  their  imitation, 
some  temperamental  excellence  that  they  are  lack- 
ing in,  some  mode  of  belief  that  they  neglect,  some 


152  MATTHEW  AKNOLD 

habit  of  thought  that  they  need  to  cultivate.     Jou-  \ 
bert  is  studied  and  portrayed  because  of  his  single- 
hearted  love  of  light,  the  purity  of  his  disinter-  ' 
ested  devotion  to  truth,  the  fine  distinction  of  his 
thought,  and  the  freedom  of  his  spirit  from  the ' 
sordid  stains  of  worldly  life.     Heine  is  a  typical, 
leader  in  the  war  of  emancipation,  the  arch-enemy 
of  Philistinism,  and  the  light-hearted,  indomitable) 
foe  of  prejudice  and  cant.     Maurice  and  Eugenie 
de  Guerin  are  winning  examples  of  the  spiritual] 
distinction  that  modern  Romanism  can  induce  in 
timely-happy  souls.     Scherer,  whose  critiques  upon 
Milton  and  Goethe  are  painstakingly  reproduced 
in  the  Mixed   Essays,  represents   French   critical 
intelligence  in  its  best  play  —  acute,  yet  compre- 
hensive;   exacting,   yet  sympathetic;  regardful  of 
nuances  and  delicately  refining,  and  yet  virile  and 
constructive.     Of  the  importance  for  modern  Eng- 
land of  emphasis  on  all  these  qualities  of  mind  and 
heart,  Arnold  was  securely  convinced. 

Moreover,  even  when  his  choice  of  subject  is  de- 
termined by  other  than  moral  considerations,  his 
treatment  is  apt,  none  the  less,  to  reveal  his  ethical 
bias.  Again  and  again  in  his  essays  on  poetry,  for 
example,  it  is  the  substance  of  poetry  that  he  is 
chiefly  anxious  to  handle,  while  the  form  is  left 
with  incidental  analysis.  Wordsworth  is  the  poet 
of  joy  in  widest  commonalty  spread  —  the  poet 
whose  criticism  of  life  is  most  sound  and  enduring 
and  salutary.     Shelley  is  a  febrile  creature,  inse- 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  153 

cure  in  his  sense  of  worldly  values,  "  a  beautiful 
and  ineffectual  angel,  beating  in  the  void  his  lu- 
minous wings  in  vain."1  The  essay  on  Heine 
helps  us  only  mediately  to  an  appreciation  of  the 
volatile  beauty  of  Heine's  songs,  or  to  an  intenser 
delight  in  the  mere  surface  play  of  hues  and  moods 
in  his  verse.  From  the  essay  on  George  Sand,  to 
be  sure,  we  receive  many  vivid  impressions  of  the 
emotional  and  imaginative  scope  of  French  ro- 
mance ;  for  this  essay  was  written  con  amove  in  the 
revivification  of  an  early  mood  of  devotion,  and  in 
an  unusually  heightened  style;  the  essay  on  Emer- 
soii  is  the  one  study  that  has  in  places  somewhat 
of  the  same  lyrical  intensity  and  the  same  vivid- 
ness of  realization.  Yet  even  in  the  essay  on 
George  Sand,  the  essayist  is,  on  the  whole,  bent  on 
revealing  the  temperament  of  the  woman  rather  in 
its  decisive  influence  on  her  theories  of  life  than 
in  its  reaction  upon  her  art  as  art.  There  is 
hardly  a  word  of  the  Komance  as  a  definite  literary 
form,  of  George  Sand's  relation  to  earlier  French 
writers  of  fiction,  or  of  her  distinctive  methods  of 
work  as  a  portray er  of  the  great  human  spectacle. 
In  short,  literature  as  art,  literary  forms  as  definite 
modes  of  artistic  expression,  the  technique  of  the 

1  This  image  may  have  been  suggested  by  a  sentence  of 
Joubert's  :  "Plato loses  himself  in  the  void,  but  one  sees  the 
play  of  his  wings,  one  hears  their  rustle.  ...  It  is  good  to 
breathe  his  air,  but  not  to  live  upon  him."  The  translation  is 
Arnold's  own.    See  his  JouberC,  in  Essays  in  Criticism,  1, 294. 


154  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

literary  craftsman,  receive,  for  the  most  part,  from 
Arnold  slight  attention. 

Perhaps  the  one  piece  of  work  in  which  Arnold 
set  himself,  with  some  thoroughness,  to  the  discus- 
sion of  a  purely  literary  problem  was  his  series  of 
lectures  on  Translating  Homer.  These  lectures 
were  produced  before  his  sense  of  responsibility 
for  the  moral  regeneration  of  the  Philistine  had 
become  importunate,  and  were  addressed  to  an 
academic  audience.  For  these  reasons,  the  treat- 
ment of  literary  topics  is  more  disinterested  and 
less  interrupted  by  practical  considerations.  In- 
deed, as  will  be  presently  noted  in  illustration  of 
another  aspect  of  Arnold's  work,  these  lectures 
contain  very  subtle  and  delicate  appreciations, 
show  everywhere  exquisite  responsiveness  to 
changing  effects  of  style,  and  enrich  gratefully 
the  vocabulary  of  impressionistic  criticism. 

Even  in  these  exceptional  lectures,  however, 
Arnold's  ethical  interest  asserts  itself.  In  the 
course  of  them  he  gives  an  account  of  the  grand 
style  in  poetry,  —  of  that  poetic  manner  that  seems 
to  him  to  stand  highest  in  the  scale  of  excellence ; 
and  he  carefully  notes  as  an  essential  of  this  manner, 
—  of  this  grand  style,  —its  moral  power;  "it  can 
form  the  character,  ...  is  edifying,  .  .  .  can 
refine  the  raw  natural  man,  .  .  .  can  transmute 
him."1  This  definition  of  the  grand  style  will  be 
discussed  presently  in  connection  with  Arnold's 

1  On  Translating  Homer,  ed.  1883,  p.  197. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  155 

general  theory  of  poetry ;  it  is  enough  to  note  here 
that  it  illustrates  the  inseparableness  in  Arnold's 
mind  between  art  and  morals. 

His  description  of  poetry  as  a  criticism  of  life 
has  already  been  mentioned.  This  doctrine  is 
early  implied  in  Arnold's  writings,  for  example, 
in  the  passage  just  quoted  from  the  lectures  on 
Translating  Homer ;  it  becomes  more  explicit  in 
the  Last  Words,  appended  to  these  lectures,  where 
the  critic  asserts  that  "  the  noble  and  profound  ap- 
plication of  ideas  to  life  is  the  most  essential  part 
of  poetic  greatness."1  It  is  elaborated  in  the  es- 
says on  Wordsivorth  (1879),  on  the  Study  of  Poetry 
(1880),  and  on  Byron  (1881).  "It  is  important, 
therefore,"  the  essay  on  Wordsworth  assures  us, 
"to  hold  fast  to  this:  that  poetry  is  at  bottom  a 
criticism  of  life ;  that  the  greatness  of  a  poet  lies 
in  his  powerful  and  beautiful  application  of  ideas 
to  life, — to  the  question:  How  to  live."2  And 
in  the  essay  on  the  Study  of  Poetry  Arnold  urges 
that  "  in  poetry,  as  a  criticism  of  life  under  the 
conditions  fixed  for  such  a  criticism  by  the  laws  of 
poetic  truth  and  poetic  beauty,  the  spirit  of  our 
race  will  find,  ...  as  time  goes  on  and  as  other 
helps  fail,  its  consolation  and  stay."3 

With  this  doctrine  of  the  indissoluble  connection 
between  the  highest  poetic  excellence  and  essential 
nobleness  of  subject-matter  probably  only  the  most 

1  On  Translating  Homer,  ed.  1883,  p.  295. 

2  Essays,  ed.  1891,  II,  p.  143.  3  Ibid.,  p.  5. 


tn'td    *.f./,*c 


156  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

irreconcilable  advocates  of  art  for  art's  sake  would 
quarrel.  So  loyal  an  adherent  of  art  as  Walter 
Pater  suggests  a  test  of  poetic  "greatness"  sub- 
stantially the  same  with  Arnold's.  "It  is  on  the 
quality  of  the  matter  it  informs  or  controls,  its 
compass,  its  variety,  its  alliance  to  great  ends,  or 
the  depth  of  the  note  of  revolt,  or  the  largeness  of 
hope  in  it,  that  the  greatness  of  literary  art  de- 
pends, as  The  Divine  Comedy,  Paradise  Lost,  Les 
Miserables,  The  English  Bible,  are  great  art." a 
This  may  be  taken  as  merely  a  different  phrasing 
of  Arnold's  principle  that  "  the  greatness  of  a  poet 
lies  in  his  powerful  and  beautiful  application  of 
ideas  to  life  —  to  the  question:  How  to  live." 
Surely,  then,  we  are  not  at  liberty  to  press  any  ob- 
jection to  Arnold's  general  theory  of  poetry  on  the 
ground  of  its  being,  in  its  essence,  over-ethical. 

There  remains  nevertheless  the  question  of  em- 
phasis. In  the  application  to  special  cases  of  this 
test  of  essential  worth,  either  the  critic  may  be 
constitutionally  biassed  in  favour  of  a  somewhat 
restricted  range  of  definite  ideas  about  life,  or  even 
when  he  is  fairly  hospitable  towards  various  moral 
idioms,  he  may  still  be  so  intent  upon  making  ethi- 
cal distinctions  as  to  fail  to  give  their  due  to  the, 
purely  artistic  qualities  of  poetry.  It  is  in  this 
latter  way  that  Arnold  is  most  apt  to  offend.  The 
emphasis  in  the  discussions  of  Wordsworth,  Shel- 
ley, Byron,  Keats,   Gray,   and  Milton  is  prevail- 

1  Pater's  Appreciations,  ed.  1890,  p.  36. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  157 

\ 

ingly  on  the  ethical  characteristics  of  each  poet; 

and  the  reader  carries  away  from  an  essay  a  vital 
conception  of  the  play  of  moral  energy  and  of  spir- 
itual passion  in  the  poet's  verse  rather  than  an  im- 
pression of  his  peculiar  adumbration  of  beauty,  the 
characteristic  rhythms  of  his  imaginative  move- 
ment, the  delicate  colour  modulations  on  the  sur- 
face of  his  image  of  life. 

It  must,  however,  be  borne  in  mind  that  Arnold 
has  specially  admitted  the  incompleteness  of  his 
description  of  poetry  as  "a  criticism  of  life ";  this 
criticism,  he  has  expressly  added,  must  be  made 
in  conformity  "to  the  laws  of  poetic  truth  and 
poetic  beauty."  "The  profound  criticism  of  life" 
characteristic  of  "  the  few  supreme  masters  "  must 
exhibit  itself  "  in  indissoluble  connection  with  the 
laws  of  poetic  truth  and  beauty." x  Is  there,  then,  . 
to  be  found  in  Arnold  any  account  of  certain  laws 
the  observance  of  which  secures  poetic  beauty  and 
truth?  Is  there  any  description  of  the  special 
ways  in  which  poetic  beauty  and  truth  manifest 
themselves,  of  the  formal  characteristics  to  be 
found  in  poetry  where  poetic  beauty  and  truth  are 
present?  Does  Arnold  either  suggest  the  methods 
the  poet  must  follow  to  attain  these  qualities,  or 
classify  the  various  subordinate  effects  through 
which  poetic  beauty  and  truth  invariably  reveal 
their  presence?  The  most  apposite  parts  of  his 
writings  to  search  for  some  declaration  on  these 

1  Essays,  ed.  1891,  II,  pp.  186-187. 


158  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

points  are  the  lectures  on  Translating  Homer,  and 
the  second  series  of  his  essays  which  deal  chiefly 
with  the  study  of  poetry.  Here,  if  anywhere,  we 
ought  to  find  a  registration  of  beliefs  as  regards 
the  precise  nature  and  source  of  poetic  beauty  and 
truth. 

And  indeed  throughout  all  these  writings,  which 
run  through  a  considerable  period  of  time,  Arnold 
makes  fairly  consistent  use  of  a  half-dozen  cate- 
gories for  his  analyses  of  poetic  effects.  These 
categories  are  substance  and  matter,  style  and 
manner,  diction  and  movement.  Of  the  substance 
of  really  great  poetry  we  learn  repeatedly  that  it 
must  be  made  up  of  ideas  of  profound  significance 
"on  man,  on  nature,  and  on  human  life."1  This 
is,  however,  merely  the  prescription  already  so 
often  noted  that  poetry,  to  reach  the  highest  ex- 
cellence, must  contain  a  penetrating  and  ennobling 
criticism  of  life.  In  the  essay  on  Byron,  however, 
there  is  something  formally  added  to  this  requisi- 
tion of  "truth  and  seriousness  of  substance  and 
matter  " ;  besides  these,  "  felicity  and  perfection  of 
diction  and  manner,  as  these  are  exhibited  in  the 
best  poets,  are  what  constitute  a  criticism  of  life 
made  in  conformity  with  the  laws  of  poetic  truth 
and  poetic  beauty."2  There  must  then  be  felicity 
and  perfection  of  diction  and  manner  in  poetry  of 
the  highest  order;  these  terms  are  somewhat  vague, 
but  serve  at  least  to  guide  us  on  our  analytic  way. 

i  Essays,  ed.  1891,  II,  p.  141.  2  Ibid.,  p.  187. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  159 

In  the  essay  on  the  Study  of  Poetry,  there  is  still 
farther  progress  made  in  the  description  of  poetic 
excellence.  "To  the  style  and  manner  of  the  best 
poetry,  their  special  character,  their  accent  is  given 
by  their  diction,  and,  even  yet  more,  by  their 
movement.  And  though  we  distinguish  between 
the  two  characters,  the  two  accents,  of  superi- 
ority" (i.e.  between  the  superiority  that  comes 
from  substance  and  the  superiority  that  comes  from 
style),  "yet  they  are  nevertheless  vitally  connected 
one  with  the  other.  The  superior  character  of 
truth  and  seriousness,  in  the  matter  and  substance 
of  the  best  poetry,  is  inseparable  from  the  superi- 
ority of  diction  and  movement  marking  its  style 
and  manner.  The  two  superiorities  are  closely 
related,  and  are  in  steadfast  proportion  one  to  the 
other.  So  far  as  high  poetic  truth  and  seriousness 
are  wanting  to  a  poet's  matter  and  substance,  so 
far  also,  we  may  be  sure,  will  a  high  poetic  stamp 
of  diction  and  movement  be  wanting  to  his  style 
and  manner."  1  _ 

Now  that  there  is  this  intimate  and  necessary  I 
union  between  a  poet's  mode  of  conceiving  life  and 
his  manner  of  poetic  expression,  is  hardly  disput- 
able. The  image  of  life  in  a  poet's  mind  is  simply 
the  outside  world  transformed  by  the  complex  of 
sensations  and  thoughts  and  emotions  peculiar  to 
the  poet;  and  this  image  inevitably  frames  for  it- 
self a  visible  and  audible  expression  that  delicately 

1  Essays,  ed.  1891,  II,  p.  22. 


160  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

utters  its  individual  character  —  distils  that  char- 
acter subtly  through  word  and  sentence,  rhythm 
and  metaphor,  image  and  figure  of  speech,  and 
through  their  integration  into  a  vital  work  of  art. 
Moreover,  the  poet's  style  is  itself  in  general  the 
product  of  the  same  personality  which  determines 
his  image  of  life,  and  must  therefore  be,  like  his 
image  of  life,  delicately  striated  with  the  markings 
of  his  play  of  thought  and  feeling  and  fancy.  The 
close  correspondence,  then,  between  the  poet's  sub- 
ject-matter and  his  manner  or  style  is  indubitable. 
The  part  of  Arnold's  conclusion  or  the  point  in  his 
method  that  is  regrettable  is  the  exclusive  stress 
that  he  throws  on  this  dependence  of  style  upon 
worth  of  substance.  He  converts  style  into  a  mere 
function  of  the  moral  quality  of  a  poet's  thought 
about  life,  and  fails  to  furnish  any  delicately  stud- 
ied categories  for  the  appreciation  of  poetic  style 
apart  from  its  moral  implications. 

Take,  for  example,  the  judgments  passed  in  the 
Study  of  Poetry  upon  various  poets ;  in  every  in- 
stance the  estimate  of  the  poet's  style  turns  upon 
the  quality  of  his  thought  about  life.  Is  it  Chau- 
cer whose  right  to  be  ranked  as  a  classic  is  mooted? 
He  cannot  be  ranked  as  a  classic  because  "the 
substance  of"  his  poetry  has  not  "high  serious- 
ness."1 Is  it  Burns  whose  relative  rank  is  being 
fixed?  Burns  through  lack  of  "  absolute  sincerity  " 
falls  short  of  "high  seriousness,"  and,  hence,  is 

*  Essays,  ed.  1891,  II,  p.  33. 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  161 

not  to  be  placed  among  the  classics.  And  thus 
continually  with  Arnold,  effects  of  style  are 
merged  in  moral  qualities,  and  the  reader  gains 
little  insight  into  the  refinements  of  poetical  man- 
ner except  as  these  derive  directly  from  the  poet's 
moral  consciousness.  The  categories  of  style  and 
manner,  diction  and  movement,  are  everywhere 
subordinated  to  the  categories  of  substance  and 
matter,  are  treated  as  almost  wholly  derivative. 
"Felicity  and  perfection  of  diction  and  manner," 
wherever  they  are  admittedly  present,  are  usually 
explained  as  the  direct  result  of  the  poet's  lofty 
conception  of  life.  Such  a  treatment  of  questions 
of  style  does  not  further  us  much  on  our  way  to  a 
knowledge  of  the  "  laws  of  poetic  beauty  and  poetic 
truth." 

Doubtless  somewhat  more  disinterested  analyses 
of  style  may  be  found  in  the  lectures  on  Translat- 
ing Homer.  These  discussions  do  not  reach  very 
definite  conclusions,  but  they  at  least  consider 
poetic  excellence  as  for  the  moment  dependent  on 
something  else  than  the  moral  mood  of  the  poet. 
For  example,  the  grand  style  is  analyzed  into  two 
varieties,  the  grand  style  in  severity  and  the  grand 
style  in  simplicity.  Each  of  these  styles  is  de- 
scribed and  illustrated  so  that  it  enters  into  the 
reader's  imagination  and  increases  his  sensitiveness 
to  poetic  excellence.  Somewhat  later  in  the  lect- 
ures, the  distinction  between  real  simplicity  in 
poetic  style  and  sophisticated  simplicity  is  drawn 

M 


162  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

with  exquisite  delicacy  of  appreciation.  Through- 
out these  passages,  there  is  an  effort  to  deal  directly 
with  artistic  effects  for  their  own  sake  and  apart 
from  their  significance  as  expressive  of  ethos.  Yet 
even  here  Arnold's  ethical  bias  reveals  itself  in  a 
tendency,  while  he  is  describing  the  moods  back  of 
these  artistic  qualities,  to  use  words  that  have 
moral  implications,  and  that  suggest  the  issue  of 
such  moods  in  conduct.  Self-restraint,  proud 
gravity,  are  among  the  moods  that  are  found  back 
of  the  grand  style  in  severity;  over-refinement, 
super-subtle  sophistication,  account  for  Tennyson's 
simplesse. 

To  bring  together,  then,  the  results  of  this  some- 
what protracted  analysis :  Arnold  ostensibly  admits 
that  poetry,  to  be  of  the  highest  excellence,  must, 
in  addition  to  containing  a  criticism  of  life  of  pro- 
found significance,  conform  to  the  laws  of  poetic 
beauty  and  truth.  He  accepts  as  necessary  cate- 
gories, for  the  appreciation  of  poetical  excellence, 
style  and  manner,  diction  and  movement.  Yet  his 
most  important  general  assertion  about  these  latter 
purely  formal  determinations  of  poetry  is  that  they 
are  inseparably  connected  with  substance  and  mat- 
ter; similarly,  whenever  he  discusses  artistic  ef- 
fects, he  is  apt  to  find  them  interesting  simply  as 
serving  to  interpret  the  artist's  prevailing  mood 
towards  life;  and  even  where,  as  is  at  times  doubt- 
less the  case,  he  escapes  for  the  moment  from  his 
ethical  interest  and  appreciates  with  imaginative 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  163 

delicacy  the  individual  quality  of  a  poem  or  a 
poet's  style,  he  is  nearly  always  found  sooner  or 
later  explaining  this  quality  as  originating  in  the 
poet's  peculiar  ethos.  As  for  any  systematic  or 
even  incidental  study  of  "the  laws  of  poetic 
beauty  and  truth,"  we  search  for  it  through  his 
pages  in  vain. 


But  it  would  be  wrong  in  characterizing  Arnold's 
essays  to  attribute  their  lack  of  theorizing  about 
questions  of  art  solely  to  his  preoccupation  with 
conduct.  For  theory  in  general  and  for  abstrac- 
tions in  general,  —  for  all  sorts  of  philosophizing, 
—  Arnold  openly  professes  his  dislike.  "  Perhaps 
we  shall  one  day  learn,"  he  says,  in  his  essay  on 
Wordsworth,  "to  make  this  proposition  general, 
and  to  say:  Poetry  is  the  reality,  philosophy  the 
illusion."  Distrust  of  the  abstract  and  of  the 
purely  theoretical  shows  itself  throughout  his 
literary  criticism  and  determines  many  of  its 
characteristics. 

His  hostility  to  systems  and  to  system-makers 
has  already  been  pointed  out;  this  hostility  admits 
of  no  exception  in  favour  of  the  systematic  critic. 
"There  is  the  judgment  of  ignorance,  the  judg- 
ment of  incompatibility,  the  judgment  of  envy  and 
jealousy.  Finally,  there  is  the  systematic  judg- 
ment, and  this  judgment  is  the  most  worthless  of 
all.  ...     Its  author  has  not  really  his  eye  upon 


164  MATTHEW  ARNOLIX 

the  professed  object  of  his  criticism  at  all,  but 
upon  something  else  which  he  wants  to  prove  by- 
means  of  that  object.  He  neither  really  tells  us, 
therefore,  anything  about  the  object,  nor  anything 
about  his  own  ignorance  of  the  object.  He  never 
fairly  looks  at  it;  he  is  looking  at  something 
else." x  This  hypnotizing  effect  that  a  preconceived 
theory  exerts  on  a  critic,  is  Arnold's  first  reason 
for  objecting  to  systematic  criticism;  the  critic 
with  a  theory  is  bound  to  find  what  he  goes  in 
search  of,  and  nothing  else.  He  goes  out  —  to 
change  somewhat  one  of  Arnold's  own  figures  — 
like  Saul,  the  son  of  Kish,  in  search  of  his  father's 
asses ;  and  he  comes  back  with  the  authentic  animals 
instead  of  the  traditional  windfall  of  a  kingdom. 

Nor  is  preoccupation  with  a  pet  theory  the  sole 
incapacity  that  Arnold  finds  in  the  systematic 
critic;  such  a  critic  is  almost  sure  to  be  over-intel- 
lectualized,  a  victim  of  abstractions  and  definitions, 
dependent  for  his  judgments  on  conceptions,  and 
lacking  in  temperamental  sensitiveness  to  the  ap- 
peal of  literature  as  art.  He  is  merely  a  triangu- 
lator  of  the  landscape  of  literature,  and  moves 
resolutely  in  his  process  of  triangulation  from  one 
fixed  point  to  another;  he  finds  significant  only 
such  parts  of  his  literary  experience  as  he  can  sum 
up  in  a  definite  abstract  formula  at  some  one  of 
these  arbitrary  halting-places;  his  ultimate  opinion 
of  the  ground  he  covers  is  merely  the  sum  total  of 

1  Mixed  Essays,  ed.  1883,  p.  209. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  165 

a  comparatively  small  number  of  such  abstract  ex- 
pressions. To  the  manifold  wealth  of  the  land- 
scape in  colour,  in  light,  in  shade,  and  in  poetic 
suggestiveness,  the  system-monger,  the  theoretical 
critic,  has  all  the  time  been  blind. 

Knowledge,  too,  even  though  it  be  not  severely 
systematized,  may  interfere  with  the  free  play  of 
critical  intelligence.     An  oversupply  of  unvitalized 
facts  or  ideas,  even  though  these  facts  or  ideas  be 
not  organized  into  an   importunate   theory,    may 
prove  disastrous  to  the  critic.     This  danger  Arnold 
has   amusingly  set   forth   in   his  Last    Words  on 
Homeric  translation :  "  Much  as  Mr.  Newman  was 
mistaken  when  he  talked  of  my  rancour,  he  is  en- 
tirely right  when  he  talks  of  my  ignorance.     And 
yet,  perverse  as  it  seems  to  say  so,  I  sometimes 
find  myself  wishing,  when  dealing  with  these  mat- 
ters of  poetical  criticism,  that  my  ignorance  were 
even  greater  than  it  is.     To  handle  these  matters 
properly,  there  is  needed  a  poise  so  perfect  that  the 
least  overweight  in  any  direction  tends  to  destroy 
the  balance.     Temper  destroys  it,  a  crotchet  de- 
stroys it,  even  erudition  may  destroy  it.     To  press 
to  the  sense  of  the  thing  with  which  one  is  dealing, 
not  to  go  off  on  some  collateral  issue  about  the 
thing,  is  the  hardest  matter  in  the  world.     The 
'thing  itself  with  which  one  is  here  dealing  — 
the  critical  perception  of  poetic  truth  —  is  of  all 
things  the  most  volatile,  elusive,  and  evanescent; 
by  even  pressing  too   impetuously  after  it,   one 


166  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

runs  the  risk  of  losing  it.  The  critic  of  poetry- 
should  have  the  finest  tact,  the  nicest  moderation, 
the  most  free,  flexible,  and  elastic  spirit  imagi- 
nable; he  should  be,  indeed,  the  'ondoyant  et 
divers, '  the  undulating  and  diverse  being  of  Mon- 
taigne. The  less  he  can  deal  with  his  object  sim- 
ply and  freely,  the  more  things  he  has  to  take  into 
account  in  dealing  with  it,  —  the  more,  in  short, 
he  has  to  encumber  himself,  —  so  much  the  greater 
force  of  spirit  he  needs  to  retain  his  elasticity. 
But  one  cannot  exactly  have  this  greater  force  by 
wishing  for  it;  so,  for  the  force  of  spirit  one  has, 
the  load  put  upon  it  is  often  heavier  than  it  will 
well  bear.  The  late  Duke  of  Wellington  said  of 
a  certain  peer  that  'it  was  a  great  pity  his  educa- 
tion had  been  so  far  too  much  for  his  abilities.'  In 
like  manner  one  often  sees  erudition  out  of  all  pro- 
portion to  its  owner's  critical  faculty.  Little  as 
I  know,  therefore,  I  am  always  apprehensive,  in 
dealing  with  poetry,  lest  even  that  little  should 
prove  too  much  for  my  abilities." 1 

Discreet  ignorance,  then,  is  Arnold's  counsel  of 
perfection  to  the  would-be  critic.  And,  accord- 
ingly, he  himself  is  desultory  from  conscientious 
motives  and  unsystematic  by  fixed  rule.  There 
are  two  passages  in  his  writings  where  he  explains 
confidentially  his  methods  and  his  reasons  for 
choosing  them.  The  first  occurs  in  a  letter  of  1864 : 
"  My  sinuous,  easy,  unpolemical  mode  of  proceed- 

1  On  Translating  Homer,  p.  245. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  167 

ing  has  been  adopted  by  me,  first,  because  I  really 
think  it  the  best  way  of  proceeding,  if  one  wants  to 
get  at,  and  keep  with,  truth ;  secondly,  because  I 
am  convinced  only  by  a  literary  form  of  this  kind 
being  given  to  them  can  ideas  such  as  mine  ever 
gain  any  access  in  a  country  such  as  ours."  x  The 
second  passage  occurs  in  the  Preface  to  his  first 
series  of  Essays  in  Criticism  (1865) :  "  Indeed,  it 
is  not  in  my  nature  —  some  of  my  critics  would 
rather  say  not  in  my  power  —  to  dispute  on  behalf 
of  any  opinion,  even  my  own,  very  obstinately. 
To  try  and  approach  truth  on  one  side  after  an- 
other, not  to  strive  or  cry,  not  to  persist  in  press- 
ing forward,  on  any  one  side,  with  violence  and 
self-will,  it  is  only  thus,  it  seems  to  me,  that  mor- 
tals may  hope  to  gain  any  vision  of  the  mysterious 
goddess,  whom  we  shall  never  see  except  in  outline. 
He  who  will  do  nothing  but  fight  impetuously 
towards  her,  on  his  own  one  favourite  particular 
line,  is  inevitably  destined  to  run  his  head  into  the 
folds  of  the  black  robe  in  which  she  is  wrapped." 2 
Such,  then,  is  Arnold's  ideal  of  critical  method. 
The  critic  is  not  to  move  from  logical  point  to 
point  as,  for  example,  Francis  Jeffrey  was  wont, 
in  his  essays,  to  move,  with  an  advocate's  devotion 
to  system  and  desire  to  make  good  some  definite 
conclusion.  Kather  he  is  to  give  rein  to  his  tem- 
perament; he  is  to  make  use  of  intuitions,  imagi- 
nations,  hints   that   touch  the  heart,    as   well  as 

1  Letters,  I,  282.  2  Essays,  ed.  1891,  I,  p.  v. 


168  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

abstract  principles,  syllogisms,  and  arguments; 
and  so  he  is  to  reach  out  tentatively  through  all 
his  powers  after  truth  if  haply  he  may  find  her;  in 
the  hope  that  thus,  keeping  close  to  the  concrete 
aspects  of  his  subject,  he  may  win  to  an  ever  more 
inclusive  and  intimate  command  of  its  surface  and 
configurations.  The  type  of  mind  most  apt  for 
this  kind  of  critical  work  is  the  "  free,  flexible,  and 
elastic  spirit,"  described  in  the  passage  just  quoted 
from  the  Last  Words;  the  "undulating  and  diverse 
being  of  Montaigne." 

A  critic  of  this  type  will  palpably  concern  him- 
self slightly  with  abstractions,  with  theorizings, 
with  definitions.  And,  indeed,  Arnold's  unwill- 
ingness to  define  becomes  at  times  almost  ludicrous. 
"Nothing  has  raised  more  questioning  among  my 
critics  than  these  words  —  noble,  the  grand  style. 
.  .  .  Alas!  the  grand  style  is  the  last  matter  in 
the  world  for  verbal  definition  to  deal  with  ade- 
quately. One  may  say  of  it  as  is  said  of  faith : 
' One  must  feel  it  in  order  to  know  it. '  " 1  Similarly 
in  the  Study  of  Poetry,  Arnold  urges :  "Critics  give 
themselves  great  labour  to  draw  out  what  in  the 
abstract  constitutes  the  characters  of  a  high  qualit}7 
of  poetry.  It  is  much  better  to  have  recourse  to 
concrete  examples.  ...  If  we  are  asked  to  define 
this  mark  and  accent  in  the  abstract,  our  answer 
must  be :  No,  for  we  should  thereby  be  darkening 
the  question,  not  clearing  it."    Again :  "  I  may  dis- 

1  On  Translating  Homer,  ed.  1883,  p.  264. 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  169 

cuss  what  in  the  abstract  constitutes  the  grand 
style;  but  that  sort  of  general  discussion  never 
much  helps  our  judgment  of  particular  instances." 1 
These  passages  are  characteristic;  rarely  indeed 
does  Arnold  consent  to  commit  himself  to  the  con- 
trol of  a  definition.  He  prefers  to  convey  into  his 
readers'  mind  a  living  realization  of  the  thing  or 
the  object  he  treats  of  rather  than  to  put  before 
them  its  logically  articulated  outlines. 

Moreover,  when  he  undertakes  the  abstract  dis- 
cussion of  a  general  term,  he  is  apt  to  be  capricious 
in  his  treatment  of  it  and  to  follow  in  his  sub- 
divisions and  classifications  some  external  clue 
rather  than  logical  structure.  In  the  essay  on 
Celtic  Literature  he  discusses  the  various  ways  of 
handling  nature  in  poetry,  and  finds  four  such 
ways  —  the  conventional  way,  the  faithful  way, 
the  Greek  way,  and  the  magical  way.  The  classi- 
fication recommends  itself  through  its  superficial 
charm  and  facility,  yet  rests  on  no  psychological 
truth,  or  at  any  rate  carries  with  it,  as  Arnold 
treats  it,  no  psychological  suggestions ;  it  gives  no 
swift  insight  into  the  origin  in  the  poet's  mind  and 
heart  of  these  different  modes  of  conceiving  of 
nature.  Hence  the  classification,  as  Arnold  uses  it, 
is  merely  a  temporary  makeshift  for  rather  grace- 
fully grouping  effects,  not  an  analytic  interpre- 
tation of  these  effects  through  a  reduction  of  them 
to  their  varying  sources  in  thought  and  feeling. 

1  On  Translating  Homer,  ed.  1883,  p.  194. 


170  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

This  may  be  taken  as  typical  of  Arnold's  critical 
methods.  As  we  read  his  essays  we  have  little 
sense  of  making  definite  progress  in  the  compre- 
hension of  literature  as  an  art  among  arts,  as  well 
as  in  the  appreciation  of  an  individual  author  or 
poem.  We  are  not  being  intellectually  oriented, 
as  in  reading  the  most  stimulating  critical  work; 
we  are  not  getting  an  ever-surer  sense  of  the  points 
of  the  compass.  Essays,  to  have  this  orienting 
power,  need  not  be  continually  prating  of  theories 
and  laws;  they  need  not  be  rabidly  scientific  in 
phrase  or  in  method.  But  they  must  issue  from  a 
mind  that  has  come  to  an  understanding  with  itself 
about  the  genesis  of  art  in  the  genius  of  the  artist; 
about  the  laws  that,  when  the  utmost  plea  has 
been  made  for  freedom  and  caprice,  regulate  ar- 
tistic production;  about  the  history  and  evolution 
of  art  forms;  and  about  the  relations  of  the  arts 
among  themselves  and  to  the  other  activities  of  life. 
It  may  fairly  be  doubted  if  Arnold  had  ever  wrought 
out  for  himself  consistent  conclusions  on  all  or 
most  of  these  topics.  Indeed,  the  mere  mention 
of  his  name  in  connection  with  such  a  formal  list 
of  topics  suggests  the  kind  of  mock-serious  depre- 
catory paragraph  with  which  the  "unlearned  bellet- 
tristic  trifler"  was  wont  to  reply  to  charges  of 
dilettantism  —  a  paragraph  sure  to  carry  in  its  tail 
a  stinging  bit  of  sarcasm  at  the  expense  of  pedantry 
and  unenlightened  formalism.  And  yet,  great  as 
must  be  every  one's  respect  for  the  thorough  schol- 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  171 

arship  and  widely  varied  accomplishment  that  Ar- 
nold made  so  light  of  and  carried  off  so  easily,  the 
doubt  must  nevertheless  remain  whether  a  firmer 
grasp  on  theory,  and  a  more  consistent  habit  of 
thinking  out  literary  questions  to  their  principles, 
would  not  have  invigorated  his  work  as  a  critic 
and  given  it  greater  permanence  and  richer  sug- 
gestiveness. 

VI 

It  is,  then,  as  an  appreciator  of  what  may  per- 
haps be  called  the  spiritual  qualities  of  literature 
that  Arnold  is  most  distinctively  a  furtherer  of 
criticism.  An  appreciator  of  beauty,  —  of  true 
beauty  wherever  found,  —  that  is  what  he  would 
willingly  be ;  and  yet,  as  the  matter  turns  out,  the 
beauty  that  he  most  surely  enjoys  and  reveals  has 
invariably  a  spiritual  aroma,  —  is  the  finer  breath 
of  intense  spiritual  life.  Or,  if  spiritual  be  too 
mystical  a  word  to  apply  to  Homer  and  Goethe, 
perhaps  Arnold  should  rather  be  termed  an  appre- 
ciator of  such  beauty  in  literature  as  carries  with 
it  an  inevitable  suggestion  of  elevation  and  noble- 
ness of  character  in  the  author. 

The  importance  of  appreciation  in  criticism  Ar- 
nold has  described  in  one  of  the  Mixed  Essays: 
"Admiration  is  salutary  and  formative;  .  .  .  but 
things  admirable  are  sown  wide,  and  are  to  be  gath- 
ered here  and  gathered  there,  not  all  in  one  place ; 
and  until  we  have  gathered  them  wherever  they  are 


172  MATTHEW  AKNoi.n 

to  be  found,  wo  liavo  not  known  the  true  salutari- 
ness  and  formativeness  of  admiration.  The  quest 
is  large;  and  occupation  with  the  unsound  or  half- 
sound,  delight  in  tin;  not  good  or  Less  good,  is  a 
sore  Let  and  hindrance  to  us.  Release  from  such 
occupation  and  delight  sets  us  free  for  ranging  far- 
ther, and  for  perfecting  our  sense  of  beauty,  lie 
is  the  happy  man,  who,  encumbering  himself  with 
the  Lore  of  nothing  which  is  not  beautiful,  is  able 
to  embrace  the  greatest  number  <>r  things  beautiful 
in  his  Life." ' 

On  this  disinterested  quest,  then,  for  the  beauti- 
ful,   Arnold    in    his    essays    nominally   fares    forth. 

Yet  certain  Limitations  in  his  appreciation,  over 
and  beyond  his  prevalent  ethical  interest,  must 
at  once  be  noted.  Music,  painting,  and  sculpt- 
ure have  seemingly  nothing  to  say  to  him.  In  his 
Letters  there  are  only  a  few  allusions  to  any  of 
these  arts,  and  such  as  ooour  do  not  surpass  in  si^- 
nifioanoe  the  oomments  of  the  ohanoe  loiterer  in 
foreign  galleries  or  visitor  of  oonoert  rooms.  In 
his  essays  there  are  none  of  the  correlations  be- 
tween the  effects  and  methods  of  Literature  and 

those  of  kindred   arts  that   may  do  so  much  either 

to  individualize  or  to  illustrate  the  characteristics 
of  poetry.  For  Arnold.  Literature  and  poetry  seem 
to  mate  u|>  the  whole  range  of  art. 

Wifhm  these  Limits,  however, — the  Limits  im- 
posed l>.y  preoooupation  with  oonduot  and  by  oare 

1  Mi.,,,1  Euaya,  ed.  L888,  p.  910. 


::.■-'; ;:iv  :-.::..-  i:  173 


C::r: 


'  '..\- 


v.  :_-•  .  v. 
'ii-l-:  11; 


174  MATTHEW  AENOLD 

peramental  sensitiveness,  delicacy  of  perception. 
To  appreciate  literature  more  and  more  sensitively 
in  terms  of  "  an  undulating  and  diverse  tempera- 
ment, "  this  is  the  ideal  that  he  puts  before  literary 
criticism. 

His  own  appreciations  of  poetry  are  probably 
richest,  most  discriminating,  and  most  disinter- 
ested in  the  lectures  on  Translating  Homer.  The 
imaginative  tact  is  unfailing  with  which  he  renders 
the  contour  and  the  subject-qualities  of  the  various 
poems  that  he  comments  on;  and  equally  note- 
worthy is  the  divining  instinct  with  which  he  capt- 
ures the  spirit  of  each  poet  and  sets  it  before  us 
with  a  phrase  or  a  symbol.  The  "  inversion  and 
pregnant  conciseness"  of  Milton's  style,  its  "la- 
borious and  condensed  fulness  " ;  the  plainspoken- 
ness,  freshness,  vigorousness,  and  yet  fancifulness 
and  curious  complexity  of  Chapman's  style;  Spen- 
ser's "  sweet  and  easy  slipping  movement " ;  Scott's 
"  bastard  epic  style  " ;  the  "  one  continual  falsetto  " 
of  Macaulay's  "pinchbeck  Roman  Ballads,"  —  all 
these  characterizations  are  delicately  sure  in  their 
phrasing  and  suggestion,  and  are  the  clearer  because 
the  various  styles  are  made  to  stand  in  continual 
contrast  with  Homer's  style,  the  rapidity,  direct- 
ness, simplicity,  and  nobleness  of  which  Arnold 
keeps  ever  present  in  our  consciousness.  Inci- 
dentally, too,  such  suggestive  discriminations  as 
that  between  sim]olesse  and  simplicity,  the  "sem- 
blance" of  simplicity  and  the  "real  quality,"  are 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  175 

wrought  out  for  the  reader  as  the  critic  goes  on 
with  his  pursuit  of  the  essential  qualities  of 
Homeric  thought  and  diction.  To  read  these  lect- 
ures is  a  thoroughly  tempering  process ;  a  process 
that  renders  the  mind  and  imagination  permanently 
finer  in  texture,  more  elastic,  more  sensitively  sure 
in  tone,  and  subtly  responsive  to  the  demands  of 
good  art. 

The  essay  on  the  Study  of  Poetry,  which  was 
written  as  preface  to  Ward's  English  Poets,  is  also 
rich  in  appreciation,  and  at  times  almost  as  disin- 
terested as  the  lectures  on  Homer;  yet  perhaps 
never  quite  so  disinterested.  For  in  the  Study  of 
Poetry  Arnold  is  persistently  aware  of  his  concep- 
tion of  "the  grand  style  "  and  bent  on  winning  his 
readers  to  make  it  their  own.  Only  poets  who 
attain  this  grand  style  deserve  to  be  "classics," 
and  the  continual  insistence  on  the  note  of  "  high 
seriousness  "  —  its  presence  or  absence  —  becomes 
rather  wearisome.  Moreover,  Arnold's  preoccupa- 
tion with  this  ultimate  manner  and  quality  tends 
to  limit  the  freedom  and  delicate  truth  of  his  ap- 
preciations of  other  manners  and  minor  qualities. 
At  times,  one  is  tempted  to  charge  Arnold  with 
some  of  the  unresponsiveness  of  temperament  that 
he  ascribes  to  systematic  critics,  and  to  find  even 
Arnold  himself  under  the  perilous  sway  of  a  fixed 
idea.  Yet,  when  all  is  said,  the  Study  of  Poetry 
is  full  of  fine  things,  and  does  much  to  widen  the 
range  of  appreciation,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to 


176  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

make  appreciation  more  certain.  "  The  liquid  dic- 
tion, the  fluid  movement  of  Chaucer,  his  large,  free, 
sound  representation  of  things  ";  Burns's  "touches 
of  piercing,  sometimes  almost  intolerable,  pathos," 
his  "archness,"  too,  and  his  "soundness";  Shel- 
ley, "that  beautiful  spirit  building  his  many -col- 
oured haze  of  words  and  images  'Pinnacled  dim  in 
the  intense  inane ' " ;  these,  and  other  interpreta- 
tions like  them,  are  easily  adequate  and  carry  the 
qualities  of  each  poet  readily  into  the  minds  and 
imaginations  of  sympathetic  readers.  Apprecia- 
tion is  much  the  richer  for  this  essay  on  the  Study 
of  Poetry. 

Nor  must  Arnold's  suggestive  appreciations  of 
prose  style  be  forgotten.  Several  of  them  have 
passed  into  standard  accounts  of  clearly  recognized 
varieties  of  prose  diction.  Arnold's  phrasing  of 
the  matter  has  made  all  sensitive  English  readers 
permanently  more  sensitive  to  "the  warm  glow, 
blithe  movement,  and  soft  pliancy  of  life  "  of  the 
Attic  style,  and  also  permanently  more  hostile  to 
"  the  over-heavy  richness  and  encumbered  gait "  of 
the  Asiatic  style.  Equally  good  is  his  account  of 
the  Corinthian  style:  "It  has  glitter  without 
warmth,  rapidity  without  ease,  effectiveness  with- 
out charm.  Its  characteristic  is  that  it  has  no 
soul;  all  it  exists  for,  is  to  get  its  ends,  to  make 
its  points,  to  damage  its  adversaries,  to  be  admired, 
to  triumph.  A  style  so  bent  on  effect  at  the  ex- 
pense of  soul,  simplicity,  and  delicacy;  a  style  so 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  177 

little  studious  of  the  charm  of  the  great  models; 
so  far  from  classic  truth  aud  grace,  must  surely  be 
said  to  have  the  note  of  provinciality." 1  "  Middle- 
class  Macaulayese"  is  his  name  for  Hepworth 
Dixon's  style;  a  style  which  he  evidently  regards , 
as  likely  to  gain  favour  and  establish  itself.  "  I 
call  it  Macaulayese  .  .  .  because  it  has  the  same 
internal  and  external  characteristics  as  Macaulay's 
style;  the  external  characteristic  being  a  hard, 
metallic  movement  with  nothing  of  the  soft  play 
of  life,  and  the  internal  characteristic  being  a  per- 
petual semblance  of  hitting  the  right  nail  on  the 
head  without  the  reality.  And  I  call  it  middle- 
class  Macaulayese,  because  it  has  these  faults 
without  the  compensation  of  great  studies  and  of 
conversance  with  great  affairs,  by  which  Macaulay 
partly  redeemed  them."2  It  will,  of  course,  be 
noted  that  these  latter  appreciations  deal  for  the 
most  part  with  divergences  from  the  beautiful  in 
style,  but  they  none  the  less  quicken  and  refine  the 
aesthetic  sense. 

Finally,  throughout  the  two  series  of  miscellane- 
ous essays  there  is,  in  the  midst  of  much  business 
with  ethical  matters,  an  often-recurring  free  play 
of  imagination  in  the  interests,  solely  and  simply, 
of  beauty.  Many  are  the  happy  windfalls  these 
essays  offer  of  delicate  interpretation  both  of  poetic 
effect  and  of  creative  movement,  and  many  are 

1  Essays,  ed.  1891,  I,  p.  75. 

2  Friendship's  Garland,  ed.  1883,  p.  279. 

N 


178  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

the  memorable  phrases  and  symbols  by  which 
incidentally  the  essential  quality  of  a  poet  or 
prose- writer  is  securely  lodged  in  the  reader's 
consciousness. 

And  yet,  wide  ranging  and  delicately  sensitive 
as  are  Arnold's  appreciations,  the  feeling  will  as- 
sert itself,  in  a  final  survey  of  his  work  in  literary 
criticism,  that  he  nearly  always  has  designs  on  his 
readers  and  that  appreciation  is  a  means  to  an  end. 
The  end  in  view  is  the  exorcism  of  the  spirit  of 
Philistinism.  Arnold's  conscience  is  haunted  by 
this  hideous  apparition  as  Luther's  was  by  the 
devil,  and  he  is  all  the  time  metaphorically  throw- 
ing his  inkstand  at  the  spectre.  Or,  to  put  the 
matter  in  another  way,  his  one  dominating  wish  is 
to  help  modern  Englishmen  to  "  conquer  the  hard 
unintelligence "  which  is  "their  bane;  to  supple 
and  reduce  it  by  culture,  by  a  growth  in  the  variety, 
fulness,  and  sweetness  of  their  spiritual  life  " ;  and 
the  appreciative  interpretation  of  literature  to  as 
wide  a  circle  of  readers  as  possible  seems  to  him 
one  of  the  surest  ways  of  thus  educing  in  his  fel- 
low-countrymen new  spiritual  qualities.  It  must 
not  be  forgotten  that  Matthew  Arnold  was  the  son 
of  Thomas  Arnold,  master  of  Kugby;  there  is  in 
him  a  hereditary  pedagogic  bias  —  an  inevitable 
trend  towards  moral  suasion.  The  pedagogic  spirit 
has  suffered  a  sea-change  into  something  rich  and 
strange,  and  yet  traces  of  its  origin  linger  about  it. 
Criticism   with   Arnold    is   rarely,    if  ever,    irre- 


MATTHEW  AKNOLD  179 

sponsible;   it  is  our  schoolmaster  to  bring  us  to 

culture. 

In  a  letter  of  1863  Arnold  speaks  of  the  great 
transformation  which  "  in  this  concluding  half  of 
the  century  the  English  spirit  is  destined  to  un- 
dergo."    "I  shall  do,"  he  adds,  "what  I  can  for 
this  movement  in  literature;  freer  perhaps  in  that 
sphere  than  I  could  be  in  any  other,  but  with  the 
risk  always  before  me,  if  I  cannot  charm  the  wild 
beast  of  Philistinism  while  I  am  trying  to  convert 
him,  of  being  torn  in  pieces  by  him." x    In  charming 
the  wild  beast  Arnold  ultimately  succeeded;  and 
yet  there  is  a  sense  in  which  he  fell  a  victim  to  his 
very  success.     The  presence  of  the  beast,  and  the 
necessity  of  fluting  to  him  debonairly  and  win- 
ningly,  fastened  themselves  on  Arnold's  imagina- 
tion, and  subdued  him  to  a  comparatively  narrow 
range  of  subjects  and  set  of  interests.     From  the 
point  of  view,  at  least,  of  what  is  desirable  in  ap- 
preciative  criticism,   Arnold  was    injured  by  his 
sense  of  responsibility;  he  lacks  the  detachment 
and  the  delicate  mobility  that  are  the  redeeming 
traits  of  modern  dilettantism. 

If,  then,  we  regard  Arnold  as  a  writer  with  a 
task  to  accomplish,  with  certain  definite  regenera- 
tive purposes  to  carry  out,  with  a  body  of  original 
ideas  about  the  conduct  of  life  to  inculcate,  we 
must  conclude  that  he  succeeded  admirably  in  his 
work,  followed  out  his  ideas  with  persistence  and 

1  Letters,  I,  240. 


180  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

temerity  through  many  regions  of  human  activity, 
and  embodied  them  with  unwearying  ingenuity  and 
persuasiveness  in  a  wide  range  of  discussions.  If, 
on  the  other  hand,  we  consider  him  solely  as  a  lit- 
erary critic,  we  are  forced  to  admit  that  he  is  not 
the  ideal  literary  critic ;  he  is  not  the  ideal  literary 
critic  because  he  is  so  much  more,  and  because  his 
interests  lie  so  decisively  outside  of  art.  Nor  is 
this  opinion  meant  to  imply  an  ultimate  theory  of 
art  for  art's  sake,  or  to  suggest  any  limitation  of 
criticism  to  mere  impressionism  or  appreciation. 
Literature  must  be  known  historically  and  philo- 
sophically before  it  can  be  adequately  appreciated; 
that  is  emphatically  true.  Art  may  or  may  not  be 
justifiable  solely  as  it  is  of  service  to  society;  that 
need  not  be  debated.  But,  in  any  event,  literary 
criticism,  if  it  is  to  reach  its  utmost  effectiveness, 
must  regard  works  of  art  for  the  time  being  as 
self-justified  integrations  of  beauty  and  truth, 
and  so  regarding  them  must  record  and  interpret 
their  power  and  their  charm.  And  this  temporary 
isolating  process  is  just  the  process  which  Arnold 
very  rarely,  for  the  reasons  that  have  been  traced 
in  detail,  is  willing  or  able  to  go  through  with. 

VII 

When  we  turn  to  consider  Arnold's  literary 
style,  we  are  forced  to  admit  that  this,  too,  has 
suffered  from  the  strenuousness  of  his  moral  pur- 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  181 

pose;  it  has  been  unduly  sophisticated,  here  and 
there,  because  of  his  desire  to  charm  "the  wild 
beast  of  Philistinism."  To  this  purpose  and  this 
desire  is  owing,  at  least  in  part,  that  falsetto  note 
—  that  half-querulous,  half-supercilious  artifici- 
ality of  tone  —  which  is  now  and  then  to  be  heard 
in  his  writing.  To  exaggerate  the  extent  to  which 
this  note  is  audible  would  doubtless  be  easy;  an 
unprejudiced  reader  will  find  long  continuous  pas- 
sages of  even  Arnold's  most  elaborately  designed 
writing  free  from  any  trace  of  undue  self-con- 
sciousness or  of  gentle  condescension.  And  yet  it 
is  undeniable  that  when,  apart  from  his  Letters, 
Arnold's  prose,  as  a  whole,  is  compared  with  that 
of  such  a  writer,  for  example,  as  Cardinal  New- 
man, there  is  in  Arnold's  style,  as  the  ear  listens 
for  the  quality  of  the  bell-metal,  not  quite  the 
same  beautifully  clear  and  sincere  resonance. 
There  seems  to  be,  now  and  then,  some  unhappy 
warring  of  elements,  some  ill-adjustment  of  over- 
tones, a  trace  of  some  flaw  in  mixing  or  casting. 

Are  not  these  defects  in  Arnold's  style  due  to 
his  somewhat  self-conscious  attempt  to  fascinate  a 
recalcitrant  public?  Is  it  not  the  assumption  of 
a  manner  that  jars  on  us  often  in  Arnold's  less 
happy  moments?  Has  he  not  the  pose  of  the  man 
who  overdoes  bravado  with  the  hope  of  getting 
cleverly  through  a  pass  which  he  feels  a  bit  trying 
to  his  nerves?  Arnold  has  a  keen  consciousness 
of  the  very  stupid  beast  of  Philistinism  lying  in 


182  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

wait  for  him ;  and  in  the  stress  of  the  moment  he, 
is  guilty  of  a  little  exaggeration  of  manner;  he  is 
just  a  shade  unnatural  in  his  flippancy;  he  treads 
his  measure  with  an  unduly  mincing  flourish.         •' 

Arnold's  habit  of  half -mocking  self-depreciation 
and  of  insincere  apology  for  supposititious  personal 
shortcomings  has  already  been  mentioned;  to  his 
controversial  writings,  particularly,  it  gives  often 
a  raspingly  supercilious  tone.  He  insists  with 
mock  humbleness  that  he  is  a  "mere  bellettristic 
trifler";  that  he  has  no  "system  of  philosophy 
with  principles  coherent,  interdependent,  subor- 
dinate, and  derivative  "  to  help  him  in  the  discus- 
sion of  abstract  questions.  He  assures  us  that  he 
is  merely  "a  feeble  unit"  of  the  "English  middle 
class";  he  deprecates  being  called  a  professor 
because  it  is  a  title  he  shares  "  with  so  many  dis- 
tinguished men  —  Professor  Pepper,  Professor  An- 
derson, Professor  Frickel,  and  others  —  who  adorn 
it,"  he  feels,  much  more  than  he  does.  These 
mock  apologies  are  always  amusing  and  yet  a  bifc 
exasperating  too.  Why  should  Arnold  regard  it, 
we  ask  ourselves,  as  such  a  relishing  joke  —  the 
possibility  that  he  has  a  defect?  The  implication 
of  almost  arrogant  self-satisfaction  is  trouble- 
somely  present  to  us.  Such  passages  certainly 
suggest  that  Arnold  had  an  ingrained  contempt 
for  the  "  beast "  he  was  charming. 

Yet,  when  all  is  said,  much  of  this  supercilious 
satire  is  irresistibly  droll,  and  refuses  to  be  gain- 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  183 

said.  One  of  his  most  effective  modes  of  ridiculing  \ 
his  opponents  is  through  conjuring  up  imaginary- 
scenes  in  which  some  ludicrous  aspect  of  his  oppo- 
nent's case  or  character  is  thrown  into  diverting 
prominence.  Is  it  the  pompous,  arrogant  self-sat- 
isfaction of  the  prosperous  middle-class  tradesman 
that  Arnold  wishes  to  satirize?  And  more  par- 
ticularly is  it  the  futility  of  the  Saturday  Review 
in  holding  up  Benthamism  —  the  systematic  recog- 
nition of  such  a  smug  man's  ideal  of  selfish  happi- 
ness —  as  the  true  moral  ideal?  Arnold  represents 
himself  as  travelling  on  a  suburban  railway  on 
which  a  murder  has  recently  been  committed,  and 
as  falling  into  chat  with  the  middle-class  frequent- 
ers of  this  route.  The  demoralization  of  these 
worthy  folk,  Arnold  assures  us,  was  "something 
bewildering."  "Myself  a  transcendentalist  (as 
the  Saturday  Review  knows),  I  escaped  the  infec- 
tion ;  and,  day  after  day,  I  used  to  ply  my  agitated 
fellow-travellers  with  all  the  consolations  which  \ 
my  transcendentalism  would  naturally  suggest  to 
me.  I  reminded  them  how  Ceesar  refused  to  take 
precautions  against  assassination,  because  life  was 
not  worth  having  at  the  price  of  an  ignoble  solici- 
tude for  it.  I  reminded  them  what  insignificant 
atoms  we  all  are  in  the  life  of  the  world.  'Sup- 
pose the  worst  to  happen,'  I  said,  addressing  a 
portly  jeweller  from  Cheapside;  'suppose  even 
yourself  to  be  the  victim;  il  n'y  a  pas  dliomme 
necessaire.     We  should  miss  you  for  a  day  or  two 


184  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

upon  the  Woodford  Branch ;  but  the  great  mundane 
movement  would  still  go  on,  the  gravel  walks  of 
your  villa  would  still  be  rolled,  dividends  would 
still  be  paid  at  the  Bank,  omnibuses  would  still 
run,  there  would  still  be  the  old  crush  at  the  corner 
of  Fenchurch  Street. '  All  was  of  no  avail.  Noth- 
ing could  moderate  in  the  bosom  of  the  great  Eng- 
lish middle  class,  their  passionate,  absorbing, 
almost  bloodthirsty  clinging  to  life."  This  is,  of 
course,  "admirable  fooling";  and  equally,  of 
course,  the  little  imaginary  scene  serves  perfectly 
the  purposes  of  Arnold's  argument  and  turns  into 
ridicule  the  narrowness  and  overweening  self- 
importance  of  the  smug  tradesman. 

Another  instance  of  Arnold's  ability  to  conjure 
up  fancifully  a  scene  of  satirical  import  may  be  ad- 
duced from  the  first  chapter  of  Culture  and  Anarchy. 
Arnold  has  been  ridiculing  the  worship  of  mere 
"  bodily  health  and  vigour  "  as  ends  in  themselves. 
"Why,  one  has  heard  people,"  he  exclaims,  "fresh 
from  reading  certain  articles  of  the  Times  on  the 
Kegistrar  General's  returns  of  marriages  and  births 
in  this  country,  who  would  talk  of  our  large  English 
families  in  quite  a  solemn  strain,  as  if  they  had 
something  in  itself,  beautiful,  elevating,  and  meri- 
torious in  them;  as  if  the  British  Philistine  would 
have  only  to  present  himself  before  the  Great  Judge 
with  his  twelve  children,  in  order  to  be  received 
among  the  sheep  as  a  matter  of  right !  " 

It  is  a  fact  worth  remarking  that  in  his  prose 


MATTHEW  AKNOLD  185 

Arnold's  imagination  seems  naturally  to  call  up 
and  visualize  only  such  scenes  as  those  that  have 
just  been  quoted  —  scenes  that  are  satirically  and 
even  maliciously  suggestive;  scenes,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  have  the  limpid  light  and  the  winning 
quality  of  many  in  Cardinal  Newman's  writings 
—  scenes  that  rest  the  eye  and  commend  them- 
selves simply  and  graciously  to  the  heart  —  are  in 
Arnold's  prose  rarely,  if  ever,  to  be  found.  This 
seems  the  less  easy  to  explain  inasmuch  as  his 
poetry,  though  of  course  not  exceptionally  rich  in 
colour,  nevertheless  shows  everywhere  a  delicately 
sure  sense  of  the  surface  of  life.  Nor  is  it  only 
the  large  sweep  of  the  earth-areas  or  the  diversified 
play  of  the  human  spectacle  that  is  abseut  from 
Arnold's  prose;  his  imagination  does  not  even 
make  itself  exceptionally  felt  through  concrete 
phrasing  or  warmth  of  colouring ;  his  style  is  usu- 
ally intellectual  almost  to  the  point  of  wanness, 
and  has  rarely  any  of  the  heightened  quality  of 
so-called  poetic  prose.  In  point  of  fact,  this  con- 
ventional restraint  in  Arnold's  style,  this  careful 
adherence  to  the  mood  of  prose,  is  a  very  signifi- 
cant matter ;  it  distinguishes  Arnold  both  as  writer 
and  as  critic  of  life  from  such  men  as  Carlyle  and 
Mr.  Ruskin.  The  meaning  of  this  quietly  conven- 
tional manner  will  be  later  considered  in  the  dis- 
cussion of  Arnold's  relation  to  his  age. 

The  two  pieces  of  writing  where  Arnold's  style 
has   most   fervour  and  imaginative  glow  are  the 


186  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

essay  on  George  Sand  and  the  discourse  on  Emer- 
son.    In  each  case  he  was  returning  in  the  choice 
of  his  subject  to  an  earlier  enthusiasm,  and  was 
reviving  a  mood  that  had  for  him  a  certain  roman- 
tic consecration.      George   Sand   had   opened   for 
him,  while  he  was  still  at  the  University,  a  whole 
world  of  rich  and  half-fearful  imaginative  experi- 
ence; a  world  where  he  had  delighted  to  follow 
through  glowing  southern  landscapes  the  journey - 
ings  of  picturesquely  rebellious  heroes  and  heroines, 
whose  passionate  declamation  laid  an  irresistible 
spell  on  his  English  fancy.    Her  love  and  portrayal 
of  rustic  nature  had  also  come  to  him  as  something 
graciously  different   from   the   sterner   and   more 
moral  or  spiritual  interpretation  of  rustic  life  to  be 
found  in  Wordsworth's  poems.    Her  personality,  in 
all  its  passionate  sincerity  and  with  its  pathetically 
unrewarded  aspirations,  had  imposed  itself  on  Ar- 
nold's imagination  both  as  this  personality  was 
revealed  in  her  books  and  as  it  was  afterward  en- 
countered in  actual  life.     All  these  early  feelings 
Arnold  revives  in  a  memorial  essay  written  in  1877, 
one  year  after  George   Sand's  death.     From  first 
to  last  the  essay  has  a  brooding  sincerity  of  tone, 
an  unconsidering  frankness,  and  an  intensity  and 
colour  of  phrase  that  are  noteworthy.     The  descrip- 
tions of  nature,  both  of  the  landscapes  to  be  found 
in  George  Sand's  romances  and  of  those  in  the 
midst  of  which  she  herself  lived,  have  a  luxuriance 
and  sensuousness  of  surface  that  Arnold  rarelv  con- 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  187 

descends  to.  The  tone  of  unguarded  devotion  may 
be  represented  by  part  of  the  concluding  paragraph 
of  the  essay:  "It  is  silent,  that  eloquent  voice! 
it  is  sunk,  that  noble,  that  speaking  head!  We 
sum  up,  as  we  best  can,  what  she  said  to  us,  and 
we  bid  her  adieu.  From  many  hearts  in  many 
lands  a  troop  of  tender  and  grateful  regrets  con- 
verge towards  her  humble  churchyard  in  Berry. 
Let  them  be  joined  by  these  words  of  sad  homage 
from  one  of  a  nation  which  she  esteemed,  and 
which  knew  her  very  little  and  very  ill."  There 
can  be  no  question  of  the  passionate  sincerity  and 
the  poetic  beauty  of  this  passage. 

Comparable  in  atmosphere  and  tone  to  this  essay 
on  George  Sand  is  the  discourse  on  Emerson,  in 
certain  parts  of  which  Arnold  again  has  the  cour- 
age of  his  emotions.  In  the  earlier  paragraphs 
there  is  the  same  revivification  of  a  youthful  mood 
as  in  the  essay  on  George  Sand.  There  is  also  the 
same  only  half -restrained  pulsation  in  the  rhythm, 
an  emotional  throb  that  at  times  almost  produces 
an  effect  of  metre.  "Forty  years  ago,  when  I  was 
an  undergraduate  at  Oxford,  voices  were  in  the  air 
there  which  haunt  my  memory  still.  Happy  the 
man  who  in  that  susceptible  season  of  youth  hears 
such  voices!  they  are  a  possession  to  him  forever." 
Of  this  discourse,  however,  only  the  introduction 
and  the  conclusion  are  of  this  intense,  self-com- 
muning passionateness ;  the  analysis  of  Emerson's 
qualities  as  writer  and  thinker,  that  makes  up  the 


188  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

greater  part  of  the  discourse,  lias  Arnold's  usual 
colloquial,  self-consciously  wary  tone. 

A  fairly  complete  survey  of  the  characteristics 
of  Arnold's  style  may  perhaps  best  be  obtained 
by  recognizing  in  his  prose-writings  four  distinct 
manners.  First  may  be  mentioned  his  least  com- 
promising, severest,  most  exact  style;  it  is  most 
consistently  present  in  the  first  of  the  Mixed  Es- 
says, that  on  Democracy  (1861).  The  sentences  are 
apt  to  be  long  and  periodic.  The  structure  of  the 
thought  is  defined  by  mean's  of  painstakingly  accu- 
rate articulations.  Progress  in  the  discussion  is 
systematic  and  is  from  time  to  time  conscientiously 
noted.  The  tone  is  earnest,  almost  anxious.  A 
strenuous,  systematic,  responsible  style,  we  may 
call  it.  Somewhat  mitigated  in  its  severities, 
somewhat  less  palpably  official,  it  remains  the  style 
of  Arnold's  technical  reports  upon  education  and 
of  great  portions  of  his  writings  on  religious  topics. 
It  is,  however,  most  adequately  exhibited  in  the 
essay  on  Democracy. 

Simpler  in  tone,  easier,  more  colloquial,  more 
casual,  is  the  style  that  Arnold  uses  in  his  literary 
essays,  in  the  uncontroversial  parts  of  the  lectures 
on  Translating  Homer,  and  in  Culture  and  Anarchy. 
This  style  is  characterized  by  its  admirable  union 
of  ease,  simplicity,  and  strength;  by  the  affability 
of  its  tone,  an  affability,  however,  that  never  degen- 
erates into  over-familiarity  or  loses  dignified  re- 
straint ;  by  its  disregard  of  method,  or  of  the  more 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  189 

pretentious  manifestations  of  method;  and  by  the 
delicate  certainty  with  which,  when  at  its  best,  it 
takes  the  reader,  despite  its  apparently  casual 
movement,  over  the  essential  aspects  of  the  subject 
under  discussion.  This  is  really  Arnold's  most 
distinctive  manner,  and  it  will  require,  after  his 
two  remaining  manners  have  been  briefly  noted, 
some  further  analysis. 

Arnold's  third  style  is  most  apt  to  appear  in 
controversial  writings  or  in  his  treatment  of  sub- 
jects where  he  is  particularly  aware  of  his  enemy, 
or  particularly  bent  on  getting  a  hearing  from  the 
inattentive  through  cleverly  malicious  satire,  or 
particularly  desirous  of  carrying  things  off  with  a 
nonchalant  air.  It  appears  in  the  controversial 
parts  of  the  lectures  on  Translating  Homer,  in 
many  chapters  of  Culture  and  Anarchy,  and  runs 
throughout  Friendship's  Garland.  Its  peculiarly 
rasping  effect  upon  many  readers  has  already  been 
described.  It  is  responsible  for  much  of  the  prej- 
udice against  Arnold's  prose. 

Arnold's  fourth  style  —  intimate,  rich  in  colour, 
intense  in  feeling,  almost  lyrical  in  tone  —  is  the 
style  that  has  just  been  noted  as  appearing  in  the 
essays  on  George  Sand  and  on  Emerson.  There  are 
not  many  passages  in  Arnold's  prose  where  this 
style  has  its  way  with  him.  But  these  passages 
are  so  individual,  and  seem  to  reveal  Arnold  with 
such  novelty  and  truth,  that  the  style  that  pervades 
them  deserves  to  be  put  by  itself. 


190  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

The  style  usually  taken  as  characteristically  Ar- 
nold's is  that  here  classed  as  his  second,  with  a 
generous  admixture  of  the  third.  Many  of  the 
qualities  of  this  style  have  already  been  suggested 
as  illustrative  of  certain  aspects  of  Arnold's  tem- 
perament or  habits  of  thought.  Various  important 
points,  however,  still  remain  to  be  appreciated. 

Colloquial  in  its  rhythms  and  its  idiom  this  style 
surely  is.  It  is  fond  of  assenting  to  its  own  prop- 
ositions ;  "  well "  and  "  yes  "  often  begin  its  sen- 
tences —  signs  of  its  casual  and  tentative  mode  of 
advance.  Arnold's  frequent  use  of  "well"  and 
"  yes  "  and  neglect  of  the  anxiously  demonstrative 
"now,"  at  the  opening  of  his  sentences,  mark  un- 
mistakably the  unrigorousness  of  his  method.  An 
easily  negligent  treatment  of  the  sentence,  too,  is 
often  noticeable ;  a  subject  is  left  suspended  while 
phrase  follows  phrase,  or  even  while  clause  follows 
clause,  until,  quite  as  in  ordinary  talk,  the  subject 
must  be  repeated,  the  beginning  of  the  sentence 
must  be  brought  freshly  to  mind.  Often  Arnold 
ends  a  sentence  and  begins  the  next  with  the  same 
word  or  phrase ;  this  trick  is  better  suited  to  talk 
than  to  formal  discourse.  Indeed,  Arnold  permits 
himself  not  a  few  of  the  inaccuracies  of  every-day 
speech.  He  uses  the  cleft  infinitive;  he  introduces 
relative  clauses  with  superfluous  "  and  "  or  "  but " ; 
he  confuses  the  present  participle  with  the  verbal 
noun  and  speaks,  for  example,  of  "the  creating  a 
current";  and  he  usually  "tries  and  does"  a  thing 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  191 

instead  of  ''trying  to  do"  it.  Finally,  his  prose 
abounds  in  exclamations  and  in  italicized  words  or 
phrases,  and  so  takes  on  much  of  the  movement 
and  rhythm  of  talk,  as  in  the  following  passage: 
"But  the  gloomy,  oppressive  dream  is  now  over. 
'Let  us  return  to  Nature ! '  And  all  the  world 
salutes  with  pride  and  joy  the  Renascence,  and 
prays  to  Heaven:  'Oh,  that  Ishmael  might  live 
before  thee ! '  Surely  the  future  belongs  to  this 
brilliant  newcomer,  with  his  animating  maxim: 
Let  us  return  to  Nature!  Ah,  what  pitfalls  are 
in  that  word  Nature!  Let  us  return  to  art  and 
science,  which  are  a  part  of  Nature;  yes.  Let 
us  return  to  a  proper  conception  of  righteousness, 
to  a  true  sense  of  the  method  and  secret  of  Jesus, 
which  have  been  all  denaturalized;  yes.  But, 
'Let  us  return  to  Nature ! '  —  do  you  mean  that  we 
are  to  give  full  swing  to  our  inclinations  ?  "  *  The 
colloquial  character  of  these  exclamations  and  the 
search,  through  the  use  of  italics,  for  stress  like 
the  accent  of  speech  are  unmistakable. 

Arnold's  fundamental  reason,  conscious  or  un- 
conscious, for  the  adoption  of  this  colloquial  tone 
and  manner,  may  probably  be  found  in  the  account 
of  the  ultimate  purpose  of  all  his  writing,  given 
near  the  close  of  Culture  and  Anarchy;  he  aims, 
not  to  inculcate  an  absolutely  determinate  system 
of  truth,  but  to  stir  his  readers  into  the  keenest 
possible  self-questioning  over  the  worth  of  their 

1  Literature  and  Dogma,  ed.  1893,  p.  321. 


192  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

stock  ideas.  "  Socrates  lias  drunk  his  hemlock  and 
is  dead ;  but  in  his  own  breast  does  not  every  man 
carry  about  with  him  a  possible  Socrates,  in  that 
power  of  disinterested  play  of  consciousness  upon 
his  stock  notions  and  habits,  of  which  this  wise 
and  admirable  man  gave  all  through  his  lifetime 
the  great  example,  and  which  was  the  secret  of  his 
incomparable  influence?  And  he  who  leads  men  to 
call  forth  and  exercise  in  themselves  this  power, 
and  who  busily  calls  it  forth  and  exercises  it  in 
himself,  is  at  the  present  moment,  perhaps,  as 
Socrates  was  in  his  time,  more  in  concert  with  the 
vital  working  of  men's  minds,  and  more  effectually 
significant,  than  any  House  of  Commons'  orator, 
or  practical  operator  in  politics."1  This  dialec- 
tical habit  of  mind  is,  Arnold  believes,  best  induced 
and  stimulated  by  the  free  colloquial  manner  of 
writing  that  he  usually  adopts. 

In  the  choice  of  words,  however,  Arnold  is  not 
noticeably  colloquial.  Less  often  in  Arnold  than 
in  Newman  is  a  familiar  phrase  caught  audaciously 
from  common  speech  and  set  with  a  sure  sense  of 
fitness  and  a  vivifying  effect  in  the  midst  of  more 
formal  expressions.  His  style,  though  idiomatic, 
stops  short  of  the  vocabulary  of  every  day;  it  is 
nice  —  instinctively  edited.  Certain  words  are 
favourites  with  him,  and,  as  is  so  often  the  case 
with  the  literary  temperament,  reveal  special  pre- 
occupations.     Such  words   are   lucidity,   urbanity, 

1  Culture  and  Anarchy,  ed.  1883,  p.  205. 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  193 

amenity,  fluid  (as  an  epithet  for  style),  vital, 
puissant. 

Arnold  is  never  afraid  of  repeating  a  word  or  a 
phrase,  hardly  enough  afraid  of  this.  His  trick  of 
ending  one  sentence  and  beginning  the  next  with 
the  same  set  of  words  has  already  been  noted.  At 
times,  his  repetitions  seem  due  to  his  attempt  to 
write  down  to  his  public;  he  will  not  confuse  them 
by  making  them  grasp  the  same  idea  twice  through 
two  different  forms  of  speech.  Often,  his  repeti- 
tions come  palpably  from  sheer  fondness  for  his 
own  happy  phraseology.  His  description  of  Shel- 
ley as  "  a  beautiful  and  ineffectual  angel,  beating 
in  the  void  his  luminous  wings  in  vain,"  pleases 
him  so  well  that  he  carries  it  over  entire  from  one 
essay  to  another;  even  a  whole  page  of  his  writing 
is  sometimes  so  transferred. 

And  indeed  iteration  and  reiteration  of  single 
phrases  or  forms  of  words  is  a  mannerism  with 
Arnold,  and  at  times  proves  one  of  his  most  effec- 
tive means  both  for  stamping  his  own  ideas  on  the 
mind  of  the  public  and  for  ridiculing  his  oppo- 
nents. Many  of  his  positive  formulas  have  become 
part  and  parcel  of  the  modern  literary  man's  equip- 
ment. His  account  of  poetry  as  "a  criticism  of 
life  " ;  his  plea  for  "  high  seriousness  "  as  essential 
to  a  classic;  his  pleasant  substitute  for  the  old 
English  word  God  —  "the  not  ourselves  which 
makes  for  righteousness";  "lucidity  of  mind"; 
"  natural  magic  "  in  the  poetic  treatment  of  nature ; 
o 


194  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

"  the  grand  style  "  in  poetry ;  these  phrases  of  his 
have  passed  into  the  literary  consciousness  and 
carried  with  them  at  least  a  superficial  recognition 
of  many  of  his  ideas. 

Iteration  Arnold  uses,  too,  as  a  weapon  of  ridi- 
cule. He  isolates  some  unluckily  symbolic  phrase 
of  his  opponent's,  points  out  its  damaging  implica- 
tions or  its  absurdity,  and  then  repeats  it  pitilessly 
as  an  ironical  refrain.  The  phrase  gains  in  gro- 
tesqueness  at  each  return  —  "  sweetening  and  gath- 
ering sweetness  evermore"  —  and,  finally,  seems 
to  the  reader  to  contain  the  distilled  quintes- 
sence of  the  foolishness  inherent  in  the  view  that 
Arnold  ridicules.  It  is  in  this  way  that  in  Culture 
and  Anarchy  the  agitation  to  "enable  a  man  to 
marry  his  deceased  wife's  sister  "  becomes  symbolic 
of  all  the  absurd  fads  of  "liberal  practitioners." 
Similarly,  when  he  is  criticising  the  cheap  enthu- 
siasm with  which  democratic  politicians  describe 
modern  life,  Arnold  culls  from  the  account  of  a 
Nottingham  child-murder  the  phrase,  "Wragg  is 
in  custody,"  and  adds  it  decoratively  after  every 
eulogy  on  present  social  conditions.  Or,  again, 
the  Times,  at  a  certain  diplomatic  crisis,  exhorts 
the  Government  to  set  forth  England's  claims 
"with  promptitude  and  energy";  and  this  gran- 
diloquent, and,  under  the  circumstances,  empty 
phrase  becomes,  as  Arnold  persistently  rings  its 
changes,  irresistibly  droll  as  symbolic  of  cheap 
bluster.     Whole  sentences  are  often  reiterated  by 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  195 

Arnold  in  this  same  satirical  fashion.  Mr.  Fred- 
eric Harrison,  in  the  course  of  a  somewhat  atra- 
bilious criticism,  had  accused  Arnold  of  being  a 
mere  dilettante  and  of  having  "no  philosophy  with 
coherent,  interdependent,  subordinate,  and  deriva- 
tive principles."  This  latter  phrase,  with  its  bris- 
tling array  of  epithets,  struck  Arnold  as  delightfully 
redolent  of  pedantry;  and,  as  has  already  been 
noted,  it  recurs  again  and  again  in  his  writings  in 
passages  of  mock  apology  and  ironical  self-depre- 
ciation. Readers  of  Literature  and  Science,  too, 
will  remember  how  amusingly  Arnold  plays  with 
"Mr.  Darwin's  famous  proposition  that  'our  an- 
cestor was  a  hairy  quadruped  furnished  with  a  tail 
and  pointed  ears,  probably  arboreal  in  his  habits.'  " 
It  should  be  noted  that  in  all  these  cases  the  phrase 
that  is  reiterated  has  a  symbolic  quality,  and  there- 
fore, in  addition  to  its  delicious  absurdity,  comes  to 
possess  a  subtly  argumentative  value. 

Akin  to  Arnold's  skilful  use  of  reiteration  is 
his  ingenuity  in  the  invention  of  telling  nicknames. 
On  three  classes  of  his  fellow-countrymen  he  has 
bestowed  names  that  have  become  generally  cur- 
rent,—  Barbarians,  Philistines,  and  Populace. 
The  Nonconformist,  because  of  his  unyielding  sec- 
tarianism, he  compares  to  Ephraim,  "a  wild  ass 
alone  by  himself."  To  Professor  Huxley,  who  has 
been  talking  of  "the  Levites  of  culture,"  Arnold 
suggests  that  "  the  poor  humanist  is  sometimes  apt 
to  regard"  men  of  science  as  the  "Nebuchadnez- 


196  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

zars "  of  culture.  The  Church  and  State  Review 
Arnold  dubs  "the  High  Church  rhinoceros";  the 
Record  is  "the  Evangelical  hyena." 

It  is  interesting  to  note  how  often  Arnold's  satire 
has  a  biblical  turn.  His  mind  is  saturated  with 
Bible  history  and  his  memory  stored  with  biblical 
phraseology;  moreover,  allusions  whether  to  the 
incidents  or  the  language  of  the  Bible  are  sure  to 
be  quickly  caught  by  English  readers;  hence  Ar- 
nold frequently  gives  point  to  his  style  through 
the  use  of  scriptural  phrases  or  illustrations. 
Many  of  the  foregoing  nicknames  come  from  bib- 
lical sources.  The  lectures  on  Homer  offer  one 
admirable  instance  of  Scripture  quotation.  Ar- 
nold has  been  urged  to  define  the  grand  style. 
With  his  customary  dislike  of  abstractions,  he 
protests  against  the  demand.  "Alas!  the  grand 
style  is  the  last  matter  in  the  world  for  verbal 
definition  to  deal  with  adequately.  One  may  say 
of  it  as  is  said  of  faith :  '  One  must  feel  it  in  order 
to  know  what  it  is.'  But,  as  of  faith,  so  too  we 
may  say  of  nobleness,  of  the  grand  style:  'Woe  to 
those  who  know  it  not! '  yet  this  expression, 
though* indefinable,  has  a  charm;  one  is  the  better 
for  considering  it;  bonum  est,  nos  hie  esse;  nay, 
one  loves  to  try  to  explain  it,  though  one  knows 
that  one  must  speak  imperfectly.  For  those,  then, 
who  ask  the  question,  What  is  the  grand  style? 
with  sincerity,  I  will  try  to  make  some  answer, 
inadequate  as  it  must  be.     Eor  those  who  ask  it 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  197 

mockingly  I  have  no  answer,  except  to  repeat  to 
them  with  compassionate  sorrow,  the  Gospel  words : 
Moriemini  in  peccatis  vestris,  Ye  shall  die  in  your 
sins." 

An  interesting  comment  on  this  habit  of  Arnold's 
of  scriptural  phrasing  occurs  in  one  of  his  letters: 
"The  Bible,"  he  says,  "is  the  only  book  well 
enough  known  to  quote  as  the  Greeks  -quoted 
Homer,  sure  that  the  quotation  would  go  home  to 
every  reader,  and  it  is  quite  astonishing  how  a 
Bible  sentence  clinches  and  sums  up  an  argument. 
'Where  the  State's  treasure  is  bestowed,'  etc.,  for 
example,  saved  me  at  least  half  a  column  of  dis- 
quisition." A  moment  later  he  adds  a  charmingly 
characteristic  explanation  as  regards  his  incidental 
use  of  Scripture  texts :  "  I  put  it  in  the  Vulgate 
Latin,  as  I  always  do  when  I  am  not  earnestly 
serious."  This  habit  of  "high  seriousness"  in 
such  matters,  it  is  to  be  feared  he  in  some  measure 
outgrew. 

Arnold's  fine  instinct  in  the  choice  of  words  has 
thus  far  been  illustrated  chiefly  as  subservient  to 
satire.  In  point  of  fact,  however,  it  is  subject  to 
no  such  limitation.  Whatever  his  purpose,  he  has 
in  a  high  degree  the  faculty  of  putting  words  to- 
gether with  a  delicate  congruity  that  gives  them  a 
permanent  hold  on  the  memory  and  imagination. 
In  this  power  of  fashioning  vital  phrases  he  far 
surpasses  Newman,  and  indeed  most  recent  writers 
except   those   who   have    developed    epigram   and 


198  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

paradox  into  a  meretricious  manner.  "A  free 
play  of  the  mind";  "disinterestedness";  "a  cur- 
rent of  true  and  fresh  ideas  " ;  "  the  note  of  pro- 
vinciality " ;  "  sweet  reasonableness  " ;  "  the  method 
of  inwardness  " ;  "  the  secret  of  Jesus  " ;  "  the  study 
of  perfection  " ;  "  the  power  of  conduct,  the  power  of 
intellect  and  knowledge,  the  power  of  beauty,  and 
the  power  of  social  life  and  manners  "  —  how  hap- 
pily vital  are  all  these  phrases!  How  perfectly 
integrated !  Yet  they  are  unelaborate  and  almost 
obvious.  Christianity  is  "  the  greatest  and  happi- 
est stroke  ever  yet  made  for  human  perfection." 
"Burke  saturates  politics  with  thought."  "Our 
august  Constitution  sometimes  looks  ...  a  colos- 
sal machine  for  the  manufacture  of  Philistines." 
"English  public  life  .  .  .  that  Thyestean  banquet 
of  claptrap."  The  Atlantic  cable  —  "that  great 
rope,  with  a  Philistine  at  each  end  of  it  talking  in- 
utilities." These  sentences  illustrate  still  further 
Arnold's  deftness  of  phrasing.  But  with  the  last 
two  or  three  we  return  to  the  ironical  manner  that 
has  already  been  exemplified. 

In  his  use  of  figures  Arnold  is  sparing;  similes 
are  few,  metaphors  by  no  means  frequent.  It  may 
be  questioned  whether  it  is  ever  the  case  with  Ar- 
nold, as  with  Newman,  that  a  whole  paragraph  is 
subtly  controlled  in  its  phrasing  by  the  presence  of 
a  single  figure  in  the  author's  mind.  Simpler  in  this 
respect  Arnold's  style  probably  is  than  even  New- 
man's; its  general  inferiority  to  Newman's  style  in 


MATTHEW  ARNOLD  199 

point  of  simplicity  is  owing  to  the  infelicities  of 
tone  and  manner  that  have  already  been  noted. 

Illustrations,  Arnold  uses  liberally  and  happily. 
He  excels  in  drawing  them  patly  from  current 
events  and  the  daily  prints.  This  increases  both 
the  actuality  of  his  discussion  —  its  immediacy  — 
and  its  appearance  of  casualness,  of  being  a  pleas- 
antly unconsidered  trifle.  For  example,  the  long 
and  elaborate  discussion,  Culture  and  Anarchy,  be- 
gins with  an  allusion  to  a  recent  article  in  the 
Quarterly  Review  on  Sainte-Beuve.  Curiosity  as  a 
habit  of  mind  had  been  somewhat  disparaged  in 
that  article,  and  it  is  through  a  colloquial  exami- 
nation of  just  what  is  involved  in  commendable 
curiosity  that  Arnold  is  led  to  his  analysis  of 
culture.  Later  in  the  same  chapter,  references 
occur  to  such  sectarian  journals  as  the  Noncon- 
formist, and  to  current  events  as  reported  and  crit- 
icised in  their  columns.  Even  in  essays  dealing 
with  purely  literary  topics  —  in  such  an  essay  as 
that  on  Eugenie  de  Guerin —  there  is  this  same 
actuality.  "While  I  was  reading  the  journal  of 
Mile,  de  Guerin,"  Arnold  tells  us,  "there  came 
into  my  hands  the  memoir  and  poems  of  a  young 
Englishwoman,  Miss  Emma  Tatham  ';  and  then 
he  uses  this  memoir  to  illustrate  the  contrasts 
between  the  poetic  traditions  of  Roman  Catholi- 
cism and  the  somewhat  sordid  intellectual  poetry 
of  English  sectarian  life.  This  closeness  of  rela- 
tion between  Arnold's  writing  and  his  daily  expe- 


200  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

rience  is  very  noticeable,  and  increases  the  reader's 
sense  of  the  novelty  and  genuineness  and  immediacy 
of  what  he  reads;  it  conduces  to  that  impression  of 
vitality  that  is,  perhaps,  in  the  last  analysis,  the 
most  characteristic  impression  the  reader  carries 
away  from  Arnold's  writings. 

VIII 

And,  indeed,  the  union  in  Arnold's  style  of  actu- 
ality with  distinction  becomes  a  very  significant 
matter  when  we  turn  to  consider  his  precise  rela- 
tion to  his  age,  for  it  suggests  what  is  perhaps  the 
most  striking  characteristic  of  his  personality  —  his 
reconciliation  of  conventionality  with  fineness  of 
spiritual  temper.      In  this  reconciliation  lies  the 
secret  of  Arnold's  relation  to  his  romantic  prede- 
cessors and  to  the  men  of  his  own  time.     He  ac- 
cepts the  actual,  conventional  life  of  the  every-day   ■ 
world  frankly  and  fully,  as  the  earlier  idealists  had  I 
never  quite  done,  and  yet  he  retains  a  strain  of , 
other-worldliness  inherited  from  the  dreamers  of  j 
former  generations.     Arnold's  gospel  of  culture  is  J 
an  attempt  to  import  into  actual  life  something  of 
the  fine  spiritual  fervour  of  the  Romanticists  with 
none  of  the  extravagance  or  the  remoteness  from 
fact  of  those  "  madmen  "  —  those  idealists  of  an  j 
earlier  age. 

Like    the    Romanticists,    Arnold    gives    to   the 
imagination    and    the    emotions    the    primacy    in 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  201 

life;  like  the  Komanticists  lie  contends  against 
formalists,  system-makers,  and  all  devotees  of 
abstractions.  It  is  by  an  exquisite  tact,  rather 
than  by  logic,  that  Arnold  in  all  doubtful  matters 
decides  between  good  and  evil.  He  keeps  to  the 
concrete  image;  he  is  an  appreciator  of  life,  not  a 
deducer  of  formulas  or  a  demonstrator.  He  is  con- 
tinually concerned  about  what  ought  to  be;  he  is 
not  cynically  or  scientifically  content  with  the 
knowledge  of  what  is.  And  yet,  unlike  the  Ko- 
manticists, Arnold  is  in  the  world,  and  of  it;  he 
has  given  heed  to  the  world-spirit's  warning,  "  sub- 
mit, submit";  he  has  "learned  the  Second  Kever- 
ence,  for  thiugs  around."  In  Arnold,  imaginative 
literature  returns  from  its  romantic  quest  for  the 
Holy  Grail  and  betakes  itself  half -humorously,  and 
yet  with  now  and  then  traces  of  the  old  fervour,  to 
the  homely  duties  of  every-day  life. 

Arnold  had  in  his  youth  been  under  the  spell  of 
romantic  poetry ;  he  had  heard  the  echoes  of  "  the 
puissant  hail"  of  those  "former  men,"  whose 
"voices  were  in  all  men's  ears."  Indeed,  much 
of  his  poetry  is  essentially  a  beautiful  threnody 
over  the  waning  of  romance,  and  in  its  tenor  bears 
witness  alike  to  the  thoroughness  with  which  he 
had  been  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  the  earlier 
idealists  and  to  his  inability  to  rest  content  with 
their  relation  to  life  and  their  accounts  of  it.  It 
is  the  unreality  of  the  idealists  that  dissatisfies 
Arnold,  their  visionary  blindness  to  fact,  their  mor- 


202  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

bid  distaste  for  the  actual.  Much  as  he  delights 
in  the  poetry  of  Shelley  and  Coleridge,  these 
qualities  in  their  work  seem  to  hirn  unsound  and 
injurious.  Or,  at  other  times,  it  is  the  capricious 
self-will  of  the  Romanticists,  their  impotent  iso- 
lation, their  enormous  egoism,  that  impress  him 
as  fatally  wrong.  Even  in  Wordsworth  he  is 
troubled  by  a  semi-untruth  and  by  the  lack  of  a 
courageous  acceptance  of  the  conditions  of  human 
life.     Wordsworth's 

"  Eyes  avert  their  ken 
From  half  of  human  fate." 

Tempered,  then,  as  Arnold  was  by  a  deep  sense 
of  the  beauty  and  nobleness  of  romantic  and  ideal- 
istic poetry,  finely  touched  as  he  was  into  sympa- 
thy with  the  whole  range  of  delicate  intuitions, 
quivering  sensibilities,  and  half-mystical  aspira- 
tions that  this  poetry  called  into  play,  he  yet  came 
to  regard  its  underlying  conceptions  of  life  as  in- 
adequate and  misleading,  and  to  feel  the  need  of 
supplementing  them  by  a  surer  and  saner  relation 
to  the  conventional  world  of  common  sense.  The 
Eomanticists  lamented  that  "the  world  is  too  much 
with  us."  Arnold  shared  their  dislike  of  the  world 
of  dull  routine,  their  fear  of  the  world  that  enslaves 
to  petty  cares ;  yet  he  came  more  and  more  to  dis- 
tinguish between  this  world  and  the  great  world  of 
common  experience,  spread  out  generously  in  the 
lives  of  all  men;  more  and  more  clearly  he  realized 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  203 

that  the  true  land  of  romance  is  in  this  region  of 
every-day  fact,  or  else  is  a  mere  mirage;  that 
"America  is  here  or  nowhere." 

Arnold,  then,  sought  to  correct  the  febrile  un- 
reality of  the  idealists  by  restoring  to  men  a  true 
sense  of  the  actual  values  of  life.  In  this  attempt 
he  had  recourse  to  Hellenic  conceptions  with  their 
sanity,  their  firm  delight  in  the  tangible  and  the 
visible,  their  regard  for  proportion  and  symmetry 
—  and  more  particularly  to  the  Hellenism  of 
Goethe.  Indeed,  Goethe  may  justly  be  called 
Arnold's  master  —  the  writer  who  had  the  largest 
share  in  determining  the  characteristic  principles 
in  his  theory  of  life.  Goethe's  formula  for  the 
ideal  life  —  Im  Ganzen,  Guten  Wahren,  resolut  zu 
leben  —  sums  up  in  a  phrase  the  plea  for  perfection, 
for  totality,  for  wisely  balanced  self-culture,  that 
Arnold  makes  in  so  many  of  his  essays  and  books. 

Allusions  to  Goethe  abound  in  Arnold's  essays, 
and  in  one  of  his  letters  he  speaks  particularly  of 
his  close  and  extended  reading  of  Goethe's  works.1 
His  splendid  poetic  tributes  to  Goethe,  in  his 
Memorial  Verses  and  Obermann,  have  given  endur- 
ing expression  to  his  admiration  for  Goethe's 
sanity,  insight,  and  serene  courage.  His  frankest 
prose  appreciation  of  Goethe  occurs  in  A  French 
Critic  on  Goethe,  where  he  characterizes  him  as 
"the  clearest,  the  largest,  the  most  helpful  thinker 
of  modern  times;  ...  in  the  width,  depth,  and 

1  Letters,  II,  165. 


J 


204  MATTHEW   AKNOLD 

richness  of  his  criticism  of  life,  by  far  our  greatest 
modern  man."1  It  is  precisely  in  this  matter 
of  the  criticism  of  life  that  Arnold  took  Goethe 
for  master.  Goethe,  as  Arnold  saw,  had  passed 
through  the  tempering  experiences  of  Komanti- 
cism;  he  had  rebelled  against  the  limitations  of 
actual  life  (in  Werther,  for  example,  and  Goetz),  and 
sought  passionately  for  the  realization  of  romantic 
dreams ;  and  he  had  finally  come  to  admit  the  fu- 
tility of  rebellion  and  to  recognize  the  treacherous 
evasiveness  of  emotional  ideals;  he  had  learned 
the  "Second  Eeverence,  for  things  around."  He 
had  found  in  self -development,  in  wise  self-disci- 
pline for  the  good  of  society,  the  secret  of  success- 
ful living.  Arnold's  gospel  of  culture  is  largely  a 
translation  of  Goethe's  doctrine  into  the  idiom  of 
the  later  years  of  the  century,  and  the  minute 
adaptation  of  it  to  the  special  needs  of  English- 
men. There  is  in  Arnold  somewhat  less  sleek 
paganism  than  in  Goethe  —  a  somewhat  more  genu- 
ine spiritual  quality.  But  the  wise  limitation  of 
the  scope  of  human  endeavour  to  this  world  is  the 
same  with  both;  so,  too,  is  the  sane  and  uncom- 
plaining acceptance  of  fact  and  the  concentration 
of  thought  and  effort  on  the  pursuit  of  tangible 
ideals  of  human  perfection.  Goethe  tempered  by 
Wordsworth  —  this  is  not  an  unfair  account  of  the 
derivation  of  Arnold's  ideal. 

From  one  point  of  view,  then,  Arnold  may  fairly 

1  Mixed  Essays,  pp.  233-234. 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  205 

enough  be  called  the  special  advocate  of  conven- 
tionality. He  recommends  and  practises  conform- 
ity to  the  demands  of  conventional  life.  He  has 
none  of  the  pose  or  the  mannerisms  of  the  seer 
or  the  bard;  he  is  a  frequenter  of  drawing-rooms 
and  a  diner-out,  and  is  fairly  adept  in  the  dialect 
and  mental  idiom  of  the  frivolously-minded.  In 
all  that  he  writes,  "he  delivers  himself,"  as  the  her- 
oine in  Peacock's  novel  urged  Scythrop  (Shelley) 
to  do,  "like  a  man  of  this  world."  He  pretends 
to  no  transcendental  second  sight  and  indulges 
in  none  of  Carlyle's  spinning-dervish  jargon.  He 
is  never  guilty  of  Ruskin's  occasional  false  sen- 
timent or  falsetto  rhetoric.  The  world  that  he 
lives  in  is  the  world  that  exists  in  the  minds  and 
thoughts  and  feelings  of  the  most  sensible  and 
cultivated  people  who  make  up  modern  society; 
the  world  over  which,  as  its  presiding  genius, 
broods  the  haunting  presence  of  Mr.  George  Mere- 
dith's Comic  Spirit.  It  is  "in  this  world"  that 
"he  has  hope,"  in  its  ever  greater  refinement,  in 
its  ever  greater  comprehensiveness,  in  its  increas- 
ing ability  to  impose  its  standards  on  others. 
When  he  half  pleads  for  an  English  Academy  — 
he  never  quite  pleads  for  one  —  he  does  this  because 
of  his  desire  for  some  organ  by  which,  in  art  and 
literature,  the  collective  sense  of  the  best  minds  in 
society  assembled  may  make  itself  effective.  So, 
too,  when  he  pleads  for  the  Established  Church  he 
does  this  for  similar  reasons;  he  is  convinced  that 


206  MATTHEW   ARNOLD 

it  offers  by  far  the  best  means  for  imposing  widely 
upon  the  nation,  as  a  standard  of  religious  experi- 
ence, what  is  most  spiritual  in  the  lives  and  aspira- 
tions of  the  greatest  number  of  cultivated  people. 
In  many  such  ways  as  these,  then,  Matthew 
Arnold's  kingdom  is  a  kingdom  of  this  world. 

And  yet,  after  all,  Arnold  wears  his  worldliness 
with  a  very  great  difference.  If  he  be  compared, 
for  example,  with  other  literary  men  of  the  world,- 
—  with  Francis  Jeffrey  or  Lord  Macaulay  or  Lock-  c 
hart,  — there  is  at  once  obvious  in  him  an  all-per-  ' 
vasive  quality  that  marks  his  temper  as  far  subtler 
and  finer  than  theirs.  His  worldliness  is  a  world- 
liness of  his  own,  compounded  out  of  many  exqui- 
site simples.  His  faith  in  poetry  is  intense  and 
absolute.  "  The  future  of  poetry,"  he  declares,  " is 
immense,  because  in  poetry,  where  it  is  worthy  of 
its  high  destinies,  our  race,  as  time  goes  on,  will 
find  an  ever  surer  and  surer  stay."  This  decla- 
ration contrasts  strikingly  with  Macaulay's  pes- 
simistic theory  of  the  essentially  make-believe 
character  of  poetry  —  a  theory  that  puts  it  on  a 
level  with  children's  games,  and,  like  the  still 
more  puerile  theory  of  Herr  Max  ISTordau,  looks 
forward  to  its  extinction  as  the  race  reaches  genu- 
ine maturity.  Poetry  always  remains  for  Arnold 
the  most  adequate  and  beautiful  mode  of  speech 
possible  to  man;  and  this  faith,  which  runs  im- 
plicitly through  all  his  writing,  is  plainly  the  out- 
come of  a  mood  very  different  from  that  of  the 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  207 

ordinary  man  of  the  world,  and  is  the  expression 
of  an  emotional  refinement  and  a  spiritual  sensitive- 
ness that  are,  at  least  in  part,  his  abiding  inheri- 
tance from  the  Bomanticists.  This  faith  is  the 
manifestation  of  the  ideal  element  in  his  nature, 
which,  in  spite  of  the  plausible  man-of-the-world 
aspect  and  tone  of  much  of  his  prose,  makes  itself 
felt  even  in  his  prose  as  the  inspirer  of  a  kind  of 
"divine  unrest." 

In  his  Preface  to  his  first  series  of  essays 
Arnold  playfully  takes  to  himself  the  name  tran- 
scendentalism To  the  stricter  sect  of  the  transcen- 
dentalists  he  can  hardly  pretend  to  belong.  He 
certainly  has  none  of  their  delight  in  envisag- 
ing mystery;  none  of  their  morbid  relish  for  an 
"  0  altitudo ! "  provided  only  the  altitude  be 
wrapped  in  clouds.  He  believes,  to  be  sure,  in 
a  "  power  not  ourselves  that  makes  for  righteous- 
ness ";  but  his  interest  in  this  power  and  his  com- 
ments upon  it  confine  themselves  almost  wholly  to 
its  plain  and  palpable  influence  upon  human  con- 
duct. Even  in  his  poetry  he  can  hardly  be  rated 
as  more  than  a  transcendentalist  manque;  and  in 
his  prose  he  is  never  so  aware  of  the  unseen  as  in 
his  poetry. 

Yet,  whether  or  no  he  be  strictly  a  transcenden- 
talist, Arnold  is,  in  Disraeli's  famous  phrase,  "on 
the- side  of  the  angels";  he  is  a  persistent  and 
ingenious  opponent  of  purely  materialistic  or  utili- 
tarian conceptions  of  life.     "The  kingdom  of  God 


208  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

is  within  you";  this  is  a  cardinal  point  in  the 
doctrine  of  Culture.  The  highest  good,  that  for 
which  every  man  should  continually  be  striving,  is 
an  inner  state  of  perfection;  material  prosperity, 
political  enactments,  religious  organizations  —  all 
these  things  are  to  be  judged  solely  according  to 
their  furtherance  of  the  spiritual  well-being  of  the 
individual;  they  are  all  mere  machinery  —  more  or 
less  ingenious  means  for  giving  to  every  man  a 
chance  to  make  the  most  of  his  life.  The  true 
"  ideal  of  human  perfection "  is  "  an  inward  spir- 
itual activity,  having  for  its  characters  increased 
sweetness,  increased  light,  increased  life,  increased 
sympathy."  Arnold's  worldliness,  then,  is  a 
worldliness  that  holds  'many  of  the  elements  of 
idealism  in  solution,  that  has  none  of  the  cynical 
acquiescence  of  unmitigated  worldliness,  that 
throughout  all  its  range  shows  the  gentle  urgency 
of  a  fine  discontent  with  fact. 

To  realize  the  subtle  and  high  quality  of  Ar- 
nold's genius,  one  has  but  to  compare  him  with 
men  of  science  or  with  rationalists  pure  and  sim- 
ple, —  with  men  like  Professor  Huxley,  Darwin, 
or  Bentham.  Their  carefulness  for  truth,  their 
intellectual  strength,  their  vast  services  to  man- 
kind, are  acknowledged  even  by  their  opponents. 
Yet  Arnold  has  a  far  wider  range  of  sensibilities 
than  any  one  of  them;  life  plays  upon  him  in  far 
richer  and  more  various  ways ;  it  touches  him  into 
response  through  associations  that  have  a  more  dis- 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  209 

tinctively  human  character,  and  that  have  a  deeper 
and  a  warmer  colour  of  emotion  drawn  out  of  the 
past  of  the  race.  In  short,  Arnold  brings  to  bear 
upon  the  present  a  finer  spiritual  appreciation  than 
the  mere  man  of  the  world  or  the  mere  man  of  sci- 
ence —  a  larger  accumulation  of  imaginative  expe- 
rience. Through  this  temperamental  scope  and 
refinement  he  is  able,  while  accepting  conventional 
and  actual  life,  to  redeem  it  in  some  measure  from 
its  routine  and  its  commonplace  character,  and  to 
import  into  it  beauty  and  meaning  and  good  from 
beyond  the  range  of  science  or  positive  truth.  All 
this  comes  from  the  fact  that,  despite  his  worldly 
conformity,  he  has  the  romantic  ferment  in  his 
blood.  If  his  conformity  be  compared  with  that 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  —  with  the  worldliness 
of  Swift  or  Addison,  —  the  transformation  wrought 
by  romantic  influences  is  appreciable  in  all  its  scope 
and  meaning. 

Finally,  Arnold  makes  of  life  an  art  rather  than 
a  science,  and  commits  the  conduct  of  it  to  an  ex- 
quisite tact,  rather  than  to  reason  or  demonstra- 
tion. The  imaginative  assimilation  of  all  the  best 
experience  of  the  past  —  this  he  regards  as  the 
right  training  to  develop  true  tact  for  the  discern- 
ment of  good  and  evil  in  all  practical  matters, 
where  probability  must  be  the  guide  of  life.  We 
are  at  once  reminded  of  Newman's  Illative  Sense, 
which  was  also  an  intuitive  faculty  for  the  dex- 
trous  apprehension   of  truth   through  the  aid  of 


\ 


210  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

the  feelings  and  the  imagination.  But  Arnold's 
new  Sense  conies  much  nearer  than  Newman's  to 
being  a  genuinely  sublimated  Common  Sense.  Ar- 
nold's own  flair  in  matters  of  art  and  life  was  as- 
tonishingly keen,  and  yet  he  would  have  been  the 
last  to  exalt  it  as  unerring.  His  faith  is  ultimately 
in  the  best  instincts  of  the  so-called  remnant  —  in 
the  collective  sense  of  the  most  cultivated,  most 
delicately  perceptive,  most  spiritually-minded 
people  of  the  world.  Through  the  combined  intui- 
tions of  such  men  sincerely  aiming  at  perfection, 
truth  in  all  that  pertains  to  the  conduct  of  life  will 
be  more  and  more  nearly  won.  Because  of  this 
faith  of  his  in  sublimated  worldly  wisdom,  Arnold, 
unlike  Newman,  is  in  sympathy  with  the  Zeitgeist 
of  a  democratic  age. 

And,  indeed,  here  seems  to  rest  Arnold's  really 
most  permanent  claim  to  gratitude  and  honour. 
He  accepts  —  with  some  sadness,  it  is  true,  and 
yet  genuinely  and  generously  —  the  modern  age, 
with  its  scientific  bias  and  its  worldly  preoccupa- 
tions ;  humanist  as  he  is,  half-romantic  lover  of  an 
elder  time,  he  yet  masters  his  regret  over  what  is 
disappearing  and  welcomes  the  present  loyally. 
Believing,  however,  in  the  continuity  of  human 
experience,  and,  above  all,  in  the  transcendent 
worth  to  mankind  of  its  spiritual  acquisitions,  won 
largely  through  the  past  domination  of  Christian 
ideals,  he  devotes  himself  to  preserving  the  quin- 
tessence of  this  ideal  life  of  former  generations  and 


V 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD  211 

insinuating  it  into  the  hearts  and  imaginations  of 
men  of  a  ruder  age.  He  converts  himself  into 
a  patient,  courageous  mediator  between  the  old 
and  the  new.  Herein  he  contrasts  with  Newman 
on  the  one  hand,  and  with  modern  devotees  of 
Eestheticisrn  on  the  other  hand.  Newman,  whose 
delicately  spiritual  temperament  was  subdued  even 
more  deeply  than  Arnold's  to  Komanticism,  shrunk 
before  the  immediacy  and  apparent  anarchy  of 
modern  life,  and  sought  to  realize  his  spiritual 
ideals  through  the  aid  of  mediaeval  formulas  and  a 
return  to  mediaeval  conceptions  and  standards  of 
truth.  Exquisite  spirituality  was  attained,  but  at 
the  cost  of  what  some  have  called  the  Great  Re- 
fusal. A  like  imperfect  synthesis  is  characteristic 
of  the  followers  of  art  for  art's  sake.  They,  too, 
give  up  common  life  as  irredeemably  crass,  as  un- 
malleable,  irreducible  to  terms  of  the  ideal.  They 
turn  for  consolation  to  their  own  dreams,  and 
frame  for  themselves  a  House  Beautiful,  where 
they  may  let  these  dreams  have  their  way,  "far 
from  the  world's  noise,"  and  "life's  confederate 
plea."  Arnold,  with  a  temperament  perhaps  as 
exacting  as  either  of  these  other  temperaments, 
takes  life  as  it  offers  itself  and  does  his  best  with 
it.  He  sees  and  feels  its  crudeness  and  disorderli- 
ness ;  but  he  has  faith  in  the  instincts  that  civil- 
ized men  have  developed  in  common,  and  finds 
in  the  working  of  these  instincts  the  continuous, 
if  irregular,  realization  of  the  ideal. 


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